Update from Jono Pons, MD
Summer 2024
To our friends and partners in mission,
Through a warm African winter our mission also heated up, with many projects taking flight and transforming lives. We hope you enjoy the revelations of God’s provision that we saw in 3 busy months from May to July 2024. Thank you for your support and prayers, as with your help we work to serve the most vulnerable, in our midst. The encouragement and inspiration I took from the COS Summer retreat is blessing us already.
5EA2
Prayer Requests
As MME steps up to the callings God provides for us to complete, we ask for your prayers in the following:
- Completion of the Hangar for Humanitarian Helicopter Service we coordinate in partnership with Mercy Air is being significantly delayed by a difficult contractor in South Africa. Please pray with us in earnest that God will move the mountains to see the construction complete in time for the approaching rainy season to protect the helicopter.
- As we mobilize funds towards construction of larger surgical space, we ask you to pray for honest contractors, with a true Christian faith that will work in good faith to build a quality facility to serve people in need for the future.
- Equipment for the clinic: That we would be blessed with Ophthalmology equipment we need from sources in USA. And that this would make it into the container being prepared in Ohio and safely to Eswatini with full tax exemption.
Actions
Corrective Pediatric Surgery for Disabled Children 1-5th May & 5th -10th June
With no public Pediatric Orthopedic Surgeon in Eswatini, surgery is available for extreme emergencies. Children living with disabilities cared for by our project Libumba Inclusion Initiative could not access corrective surgical interventions. Until Dr Joe and his wife, Physiotherapist Fiona came, supported in faith by their UK church. Within 8-months they mobilized funds, volunteer surgeons and the families of patients, many of whom were very scared and hesitant, to achieve an unbelievable result. 12 children with disabilities were operated on successfully, all now able to straighten and use their legs and feet for the first time. Weekly therapy with our Swazi community workers will now take them even further. We thank God for this couple and pray he blesses them for their love for these children and for God.
Dean McGee Eye Institute Residents Learning Trip 10th – 18th May
Another great DMEI Residents Learning visit, with Faculty shared an amazing learning time with my teams, bringing suitcases of eye medications and products difficult to source here. We shared this blessing across all the national Eye Clinics and 12 people received Cornea transplants and DMEI enjoyed training and daily fellowship with our community.
MSIC Course Cape Town – Training the Nex Generation of Ophthalmologists 5th – 9th June
I was blessed to teach MSIC to another packed course in Cape Town, with Dr Ryan Hadaway my current Ophthalmology Trainee this class with doctors from Southern and Central Africa. With my colleagues at University of Cape Town we have a 3 days course in a skills lab which is essential in the training pathway of Africa Ophthalmologists and the only one of its kind in the world. Ryan was able to share with his peers prior to his next exams, which he passed. He shows immense daily commitment to the field, serving hundreds of patients each week in clinics and stretching his surgical skills. I pray can establish a new training facility to enable greater numbers of trainees to fill the growing skills gap.
Namaqualand Cataract Outreach – Long-Term Blind Clients See Again 23rd – 29th June
Drawn by immense numbers and the sheer length of time clients in Northern Cape South Africa remain blind before reaching help, I work with partners to mobilize teams of energetic professionals for high volume surgery weeks. This time we removed 85 cataracts in just 3 days with a team including Dr Joe Northway, our Orthopedic Volunteer and Dr Martin Wasik, volunteer Pediatric Ophthalmologist joining us for the 3rd time in 3 years. Such willing hands make these intensely busy outreaches a joy to deliver 3 times a year. All partners fundraise and invest donations to give surgery free to clients selected as desperately in need. Most are family breadwinners and lose work due to blindness. All hear the good news of Jesus and that the whole teams are motivated by the love of God to restore their sight and lives.
DMEI team with welcome donations during Dr. Pons USA Tour
Grace Vision: Small room, big hearts!
Dr. Pons and Dr. Wasik busy in South Africa 18th July-4th August, 2024.
Helen and I arrived in Atlanta on the day Delta Airlines computers crashed. Worried we would be trapped in that airport forever, but thanks to an exceptional pilot (and some prayer!), our flight eventually made it to South Bend. I needed to service our microscope at the manufacturer in Michigan with Dr Stan Pletcher, who with Shelly, were wonderful hosts. My highlight was visiting his clinics and meeting the EyeMobil team and seeing their great work. Stan kindly updated the light source, the beam splitter and fitted a motorized drive for focus. We went on to Asheville where Dr Van and Margaret Joffrion hosted us for 2 days of fellowship, before the COS conference. What an exceptional program we enjoyed, matched by superb testimonies, clinical and practice insights and of course the highlight is the fellowship with our fellow Believers. Next was Oklahoma, where Prof Brad and Dianne Farris hosted us while I had several speaking engagements including Grand Rounds at Dean Mc Gee Eye Institute. For the Senior Residents, I gave a 1-day MSIC course using the Cape Town Simulated Surgical course model and materials, a happy day for all, learning eye surgery! One of the most memorable events was the dinner hosted by Barbi Moore at Bethany First Church of the Nazarene: she brought together local folks with a love for mission work in Eswatini. It was a great meal and talks on various aspects of DMEI work in Eswatini. Dr Jeremy Tan announced the results of his successful fund raiser towards purchasing a Pentacam for Eswatini, something we are all exceptionally excited and grateful for. Besides a delayed flight, the journey home was otherwise uneventful, and via Cape Town where Helen and I celebrated Helen’s father on his 90th birthday. I wish to thank everyone who was a part of our 2024 USA trip, we were blessed!
Dr. Stan Pletcher-EyeMobil updates microscope
Surgical team
Dr. Pons and Dr. Mark Robinson at the 49th COS Annual Meeting in Greenville, SC, USA.
Latest Blessings
GRACE VISION – GOD’S VISION AND PROVISION
After heeding God’s calling to establish new services in Eswatini to increase access to specialist eye care, I have worked in faith with my team to build a foundation for comprehensive clinical platforms that will serve all people. In just 2 years Grace Vision Clinics, now in 3 locations, have served thousands of clients and can now, with COS support, sponsor care for patients assessed as too vulnerable to afford care. The company now supports overhead costs of our NGO, Medical Mission Eswatini, the vehicle that facilitates numerous public care programs. Using profit for income to fund charitable work alongside other donorship brings freedom to follow God’s callings as well as well as meet all donor grant goals.
ELECTIVE STUDENTS – SHARING ESWATINI AND CHRIST WITH YOUNG DOCTORS
We have a constant stream of young medical elective students visiting from UK, Austria, the Netherlands and Germany. They arrive with great anticipation and energy for working in new and challenging environment and grow resilience in primary health and hospital services. Students come to Wednesday fellowship meal at our home, and quickly become a part of the community. We welcome and take great inspiration from them and ask you to share this opportunity.
Sending you our love and warm greetings!
Jonathan and Helen Pons
