Missions

Mark R. Hagen, MD
Sudan 1993

I worked in Somalia in Mogadishu at a time of great unrest

I was working under the auspices of Samaritan’s Purse which is headed up by Franklin Graham, Billy Graham’s son.

I enlisted to go back to Mogadishu in Somalia in October of 1993 but just prior to our leaving the unrest escalated and several Marines were killed so all of the missionary groups got out of Mogadishu at that time. The US and all the troops from various countries and from the United Nations pulled out so none of the missionary groups were willing to stay at this point. I already had plane tickets for Nairobi at that point, so Franklin Graham requested we be sent into southern Sudan.

Sudan is an area of civil war. It is the longest area of civil war in the world, for over forty years now.

The north has been fighting the south. The south has been trying to secede, and Samaritan’s Purse has been working in that area helping the people in the South who have been fleeing the troops in the North. We were flown into a small village in southern Sudan that was unknown to the government in the north. It was actually under the protection of the Sudaneese Liberation Army. We had to get their permission to be in there. We couldn’t make radio contact or give out our coordinates because the radios were being monitored. I flew in with Henry Waldorff who is a nurse from Westfield. He and I went together along with two other physicians and several nurses.

We were working in a village of about 2500 people. They had two health care workers that had a couple of years of nurse’s training. We were teaching them basic cookbook medicine. They had a book put out by the World Health Organization for practicing where there was no physician present. Medicines were being provided by the World Health Organization. There were basic medications like choloroquin and antibiotics.

Our village was guarded by a small group of rebels who were actually very friendly toward us. There was occasionally gunfire off in the distance and we were never sure if there was impending conflict or they were just practicing.

We were there for almost three weeks holding clinics every day. We would occasionally get food drops and medicine drops from the air. It was pretty rustic living. As you can tell from the pictures, we lived in tents. We treated a variety of illnesses from common infections, diarrhea, dehydration, malaria and occasional gun shot wounds. We made a lot of friends in the village. The people were, of course, very grateful. A sad postscript is that about a month after we were there, they did come in and burn the village to the ground. They killed at least 50 of the villagers and scattered the rest of the village. There has been no contact with any of those villagers since then. Samaritan’s Purse has renovated the bombed out hospital south of that area and continues to work in other areas nearby.

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