Getting Ready

I have had my shots....I am taking malaria pills and creating a "pile" in my closet.

Every 30 seconds a child dies from malaria!

That is the reason that thirty-five of us from the Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church will be leaving as a team on Friday, November 7 for Cote d'Ivoire on the West Coast of Africa. Our mission is to represent the church and assist in the delivery of life-saving bed nets. This historic trip marks the first time that churches have participated in the on-the-ground delivery of nets. With our team we will hand deliver 855,000 nets to the neediest Ivory Coast residents as a part of a national measles vaccination campaign, led by the Cote d’Ivoire ministry of health, the Measles Initiative, UNICEF, the World Health Organization and other partners.

How does it work?
Bed nets work in two ways. They stop mosquitoes from biting during the night and spreading the disease, and the insecticide on the net kills the mosquitoes when they land on it.

There are medicines used to treat and prevent the disease, but often they are expensive and not widely available. Insecticide-treated bed nets have been identified as the most cost effective way to prevent the spread of malaria.

Treated bed nets cost $10. More often than not, entire families sleep under one net, and the nets are effective for approximately five years.

The people of the United Methodist Church are founding partners of Nothing But Nets, along with National Basketball Association’s NBA Cares and Sports Illustrated. The United Nations Foundation created the Nothing But Nets campaign in 2006. Other partners include VH1, The Mark J. Gordon Foundation, AOL Black Voices, The Wasserman Foundation, Major League Soccer’s MLS W.O.R.K.S., the Women’s National Basketball Association, and Rotarians’ Action Group on Malaria.