SPINS Takes an Active Interest in Southern Belize's Mayan Community

Nestled in the Southern region of Belize is a population of Mayans who are in great need. The Mayan children, whose undeniable spirit and charm yearn for the basic human rights of health, nutrition and well-being, are especially heartening. I was recently lucky enough to meet these incredible and inspiring children firsthand and am thrilled to share my Belize experience with each of you.

In partnership with Vitamin Angels, SPINS is investing in a 3-year campaign to eradicate childhood blindness and malnutrition in this community.

We have received the full support of the Mayan Ministry of Health, Ministry of Education, Pan American Health Organization and UNICEF. In addition, we have received financial support from Presence Marketing and Pharmaca Integrative Pharmacy, and product support from Tishcon.

Howard Schiffer, President of Vitamin Angels, and I officially launched the Belize Children's Health Program on November 27, 2007, when Vitamin Angels and SPINS Inc. distributed the first round of Vitamin A Supplements and De-worming medicine to Mayan children throughout Southern Belize . It is estimated that 60 percent of Mayan children have parasitical worms caused by four basic health needs: Nutrition, Sanitation, Water and Hygiene. In addition, the majority of Mayan children are at a high-risk of going blind due to Vitamin A deficiency.

We began our campaign by meeting with the Ministry of Health and a group of local community nursing aides to gain their perspective on the issues facing Southern Belize and further discuss how to effectively communicate and educate the Mayan natives on the purpose of our vitamin distributions. It is important to note that the community nursing aids are village appointed and often times the sole medical resource for these communities. The community nursing aids often lack a formal education and rely heavily on such meetings to gain knowledge of the issues facing their communities.

In this initial meeting, I learned that each village ranges in size from 22 families to 125 families. A family consists of six to 14 children. Historically, women receive a primary level education (through grade six) and marry when they are between 14 and 16 years old; men receive education, through grade eight, and marry at the age of 16 to 18. Many of the villages do not have clean water and the source for the few that do is typically one shared well located in the village center. The majority of villages are without electricity, telephones and most certainly computers or Internet access points. There is no refrigeration and all cooking is done outdoors. There is no indoor plumbing and even outdoor latrines are a luxury to many – huts that have latrines range from 10 percent in the most remote villages to 60 percent in the most developed. For households without latrines, family members must relieve themselves near the huts or in some cases in the jungle. Farm animals, such as chickens and pigs, roam freely and access the same river that the locals use for collecting drinking water, bathing and laundry. Children do not wear shoes and commonly play and run through feces and pig slop. This is how most of the parasitical worms are contracted - through scabies or open sores. Many of these villages are located in the remote areas of the jungle and have little or no access to commerce. The majority of the men are farmers, and receive income only once per year when their crops are harvested and sold. During years when natural elements result in a bad crop, the community will go without income for long periods of time. Many of these communities are so poor that even when they are able to produce high value crops, such as fruits and vegetables, the natives can't afford to keep them. Instead, the high-value crops must be sold so that the farmers can afford to feed their families on less expensive rice, beans, corn and the meat produced on their farms. The lack of fruits and vegetables, providing vital nutrients, contribute to severe malnutrition and vitamin deficiencies.

One such village, Otoxha, was the second village we visited on the first day of distribution. What I expected to see was a community content on getting by and hardened by the everyday challenges of life as they know it. What I did not expect to see was a community with such hope and promise, full of people so happy to see us and so eager to learn about how they can improve their well-being. A community that values education and has children who are being educated by professionals who are giving back to their community with the hope that these children will have opportunities historically not available to them. What these children so desperately need is the opportunity for their minds and bodies to develop to their fullest potential through proper nutrition and health.

The initial goal of SPINS' partnership with Vitamin Angels is to deliver Vitamin A supplementation and de-worming medicine. Once this objective has been met, our intent is to expand the program to include children's multi-vitamins, prenatal nutrients and finally preconception nutrients. In parallel to these supplementation programs we are working to educate these villages on the importance of washing fruits and vegetables, drinking clean water, building and using latrines, wearing shoes and cleaning hands and fingernails. Beyond providing vital nutrition, our goal is to not only educate these communities on this action but to help facilitate preventative measures by providing access to shoes, latrines and clean drinking water. By achieving these goals, we will provide the Mayan children with hope and a foundation that will in turn lead to improvements in education, commerce and ultimately result in fully developed communities.

The Mayan Children of Southern Belize represent one of many communities throughout the world that are in need of our support. Vitamin Angels' goal is to eradicate blindness for 20 million malnourished children by the year 2020. To date, Vitamin Angels is reaching 4.5 million of these children. Since these communities are the poorest in the world, a small donation can affect thousands of lives. Being in the health and wellness industry makes it even more imperative that we do everything we can to support this initiative. Many of my peers and colleagues have taken on this challenge and I encourage you to do the same.

Sincerely,

Tony Olson
CEO, SPINS, Inc.