CAMDOC

Sanitation & Health

Total Sanitation

The big challenge is to get sanitation concepts accepted by the village population. The current status is that a vast majority of the people do not have a toilet, have no idea why to wash their hands after doing their relief. Especially the women have a lack of privacy. It is through the women that we want to introduce the concept of total sanitation and PHAST (Participatory Hygiene And Sanitation Transformation) as described by the World Health Organisation W.H.O.
CAMDOC staff, some school teachers and nurses from the local health center are the persons, after training, to help us bring the people in the villages to a level of understanding and accepting basic sanitation. Once started with such a program it must be possible to acquire financial sources to actually improve the hygiene situation by supporting the villagers in building sustainable toilets and making them understand the necessity of washing their hands with soap and brushing their teeth.

Clean Drinking Water

CAMDOC runs an intensive program to rapidly increase the number of simple low cost clean pump wells. By measuring on location we found out, that several of the existing 'clean water' pump wells were contaminated with E-coli, one of the main causes of diahrroea and other infections. CAMDOC will try to introduce the several methods of cleaning the water from bacterea e.g. the SODIS mehod by exposing the water in plastic bottles to the sunlight, or with ceramic filters, to be produced in the area.
Highly important, in this respect, is to make people understand that the immediate surrounding of the wells must be kept free from human and animal excrements.

Composting Toilets

The idea is to introduce composting toilets, starting with a pilot project at the CAMDOC Training Center. Both the urine and the composted faeces can be used as fertilizer in the garden or on the land. The 'grey' waste water can be cleaned through the use of a bed of plants (e.g. Typha reed), from which the remaining dry material can be re-used for composting the faeces. As an educational project at the center or at schools, it teaches the children hygiene coupled to ecology.
Proven succes urges to find budgets for large scale introduction of the concept as projects of the total sanitation program.

dental hygiene and health

In 2009 CAMDOC and Cambodia Child Aid introduced a tooth hygiene program Over a 1000 students of three primary schools have been given tooth brushes and tooth paste and an introduction on 'how to...' and basic dental hygiene. At location an evaluation has been done on how the project is accepted and how to continue. It acknowledged that people have better awareness of the importance of good tooth maintenance. It will however last a while to get them willing to spend a small amount of their monthly budget on mouth hygiene. Private donations allow us to continue the program and even extend it gradually. The support on the longer term as well as for basic dental care by dentists depends on donations.
Efforts are made to orginize volunteer dentists from Europe and USA to practice in the villages from time to time.

With support of CCA, CAMDOC has started a program to sell tooth brushes and paste, as well as soap and washing detergent for prices about half the shop prices, just to get people that far that they spend a small part of their monthly budget to buy and use hygiene related products

Medical Care

The 14 villages share one local health center, only manned with nurses. There is no system of calling a doctor, no possibility for medical transport of very sick people. In principle, medical care is free for all, in practice, the patients have to pay for transport, pay the doctors and nurses, because also these have very little earnings. CAMDOC/CCA supports the health center with basic facilities, like a renewed water distribution system with wash bowls in the treatment rooms, necessary furniture (patient beds) and from time to time some medical materials.
Together with Cambodia Child Aid, CAMDOC wants to introduce a cheap basic system of medical alarm and transport, as well as elementary financial support for treatment of the very sick poor. The main focus is on the treatment of sick children, which is really free of charge in two special children hospitals in 30 km nearby Siem Reap City.
Just like in the case of dental care, attempts are made to organize volunteering medical doctors from Europe and the USA to do health checks on location, every now and then.