HARARE, Zimbabwe (BP) — Because Sanyati Baptist Hospital in Zimbabwe – a high-profile ministry of Southern Baptist international missions since the 1950s – is the only source of health care available for many of the 90,000 people, a lack of medical supplies and water has become critical. Besides its inpatient load, Sanyati cares for 150 outpatients a day and delivers about 1,500 babies each year.

Baptist Global Response Executive Director Jeff Palmer and Sub-Sahara Africa area director Mark Hatfield visited Sanyati in late 2007 and were distressed to find the hospital’s essential medicines nearly depleted and unlikely to be replenished by the government.

“Italian Baptists had generously given an ambulance, two washing machines, and money for supplies to help with the situation,” Hatfield said. “We requested $45,000 in Southern Baptist relief funds to provide a supply of basic antibiotics, anti-malarial medicines, and many other essentials.

BGR is making plans to address the water problem as well, said Byler, Sanyati’s medical director.

Baptist Global Response has asked the International Mission Board’s logistics coordinator in Zimbabwe, Barry Robinson, to work with an irrigation firm on a feasibility study, Hatfield said.

“The municipal water system works when they have electricity, but the last seven kilometers of that system, including two large pumps, a huge holding tank at the municipality, and the actual pipeline, is owned and maintained by the hospital,” he explained. “One of the pumps does not work at all.”

Through the restocking of Sanyati’s essential medicines, Southern Baptists will make a difference in the lives of about 20,000 families, and for many the impact will be life-saving, Hatfield said.