Namibia

This week in the office there was a 5 day training for the Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS) part of the study. This has been a bit delayed in being rolled out because there were some procurement issues with the insecticide we are using and staff hiring delays as well. But better late than never! We … Continue reading »

I wish I could start every work week on Tuesday. That one fewer day of work really makes a difference. You get to Wednesday so much faster and then it’s all down hill from there. Sometimes just getting through Wednesday, even when you start on Tuesday, seems like a challenge. We have our staff meeting … Continue reading »

During my previous weekend in Kasane, I had seen several private vehicles driving in Chobe National Park, on the dirt roads and not just the paved road I had driven on to get to Kasane. It seemed like a cool thing to do, so as I came into town on Friday, I stopped at the … Continue reading »

On Saturday morning I got picked up at 8:30 for a day trip to Vic Falls. A 15 passenger van came and I think everyone who was staying at the lodge the previous night climbed aboard for the trip over the border. At the border crossing I talked to two American women who are medical … Continue reading »

I had a short week at work from March 22-24 because both Monday and Friday were holidays. I thought with an extra day off the staff would be energized for the week, but I was wrong. Perhaps they were just trying to get through the days until they had a 4 day weekend. I know … Continue reading »

On Saturday morning, I packed up the Hilux and hit the road for Botswana! With Monday off, I decided to spend the long weekend in Kasane, Botswana, which is just over the border and right next to Chobe National Park. Jacob and I spent a few days in Chobe two years ago and it’s definitely … Continue reading »

Last week I gave a short presentation at our weekly staff meeting about bribery. Since the major funding for this project comes from the Novartis Foundation, we have to follow their rules and regulations and they recently developed an official stance on bribery. The main point is: bribery is illegal and you shouldn’t give or receive … Continue reading »

I’ve been working so much during the week that I never have the energy to write a blog entry at the end of the day. Plus, I don’t believe that my daily activities warrant a play-by-play description of what I’m doing; I think most people would find it rather boring, because, quite frankly, some of … Continue reading »

Until this point, the two field teams have been going to the same place each day and investigating the same index case. But now that it’s been a few weeks and they are getting the hang of things, Kate and I decided to send the two teams to different places with one of us supervising each … Continue reading »

We found two index cases of malaria in the same village so decided to investigate there on Wednesday. It was easy to find the first case but there was no GR-ID on the household so we had to identify the six closest houses on the fly. While the nurses set up, Vincent (one of the … Continue reading »

On Tuesday morning I got introduced to the “situation room”. This is a container office that UCSF paid for and had installed at the Katima Mulilo Hospital, which is where the Ministry of Health has their regional offices. It is still getting set up and right now there’s just a table and three chairs inside, … Continue reading »

On Monday morning I went to the office in Katima for the first time. The project’s office is located at the University of Namibia (UNAM) and the Katima campus is new and very modern. The buildings are either brick or concrete and the campus is laid out nicely. It’s so dry out here that grass … Continue reading »

On Sunday morning Kate picked me up and we drove to the domestic airport for our flight to Katima, where our field site is located. Windhoek actually has two airports: the international airport, which is located outside of town, and the domestic airport, which is right next to downtown. Only Air Namibia operates flights from the … Continue reading »

Now that I’ve found some good maps, I can give you some context about Namibia and where I’ll be working. This is Africa and Namibia is highlighted: Here’s an up-close map of Namibia: Namibia has a beautiful flag which is prominently displayed on many streets: Windhoek is the capitol and the largest city; it has … Continue reading »

It’s been 11 months since I embarked on my last adventure (hiking the entire Pacific Crest Trail) and now I’m in transit to the next one, this one for work. Two weeks ago I started a new job working at the University of California, San Francisco in the Malaria Elimination Initiative (MEI). The name of … Continue reading »