Surgery for Meseret

Meseret has been working for us as a housekeeper here in Ethiopia for two and a half years. She has degenerative arthritis in her hip. Recently, she started having terrible pain, bad enough that she has had great difficulty walking and is now confined to bed. We sent her to one of the best hospitals in the city, where she was told her hip has begun to fracture at the leg joint. To correct this, she will require surgery to implant a metal rod in her leg and artificial hip joint. The surgery will cost over 150,000 Birr and there will be some costs afterwards, as she will be confined to bed for upwards of six months. Without the surgery, she will never walk again. 

Meseret is 39 years of age and a single mother to two teenage daughters. She has no health insurance, and the cost of the surgery is 50 times greater than the monthly salary we give her (which is considered generous by Ethiopian standards). We want to ensure Meseret can have the surgery she needs so she can enjoy a normal life and continue to be in a position to support herself and her family when we return to Canada in the summer. Between now and then, we will continue to pay her salary, her children's school fees and any follow up medical costs. We will also be contributing $2,000 to the cost of her surgery.