OREGON — In January 2010, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. News coverage scenes showed massive and widespread devastation.
It is estimated that 316,000 people died and 1,000,000 people were made homeless as a result of the earthquake.
A key argument in the embryonic stem cell debate — widely invoked by scientists, patient advocacy groups, and politicians —
involves the fate of frozen embryos.
Barack Obama put it this way in 2008: “If we are going to discard those embryos, and we know there is potential research that could lead to curing debilitating diseases — Alzheimer’s, Lou Gehrig’s disease — if that possibility presents itself, then I think that we should, in a careful way, go ahead and pursue that research.”
The head of the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Francis Collins, embraced this same line of reasoning by
The University of Notre Dame Liturgical Choir will be presenting a concert of sacred music at St. Andrew Church on Monday, May 10, to benefit St. Hermine’s Home for the Destitute in Tamilnadu, India.
Following is an update of a story that ran in the January 28 issue of the Catholic Herald about Pam Charles, a Beloit nurse and volunteer for Health Ministries for Haiti. She was at an orphanage in Haiti when the January 12 earthquake occurred.
BELOIT — According to recent information from the orphanage at Croix Des Bouquets, Beloit nurse Pam Charles said, school classes are still not in session due to the damage from the earthquake. She said some of the wooden pieces, used for school desks, were burned to use for firewood for cooking purposes.
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| Beloit nurse Pam Charles ministers to a child at the orphanage in Haiti where she was working as a volunteer when the earthquake struck. (Contributed photo) |
BELOIT — A call for action comes through in Pam Charles’ voice as she describes the urgent need for donations of money for an orphanage in Haiti where she was a volunteer when the January 12 earthquake hit the island nation.
Charles, a nurse, mother of four children, and member of Our Lady of the Assumption Parish in Beloit, was in Haiti with a group of six women serving as volunteers for Health Ministries for Haiti (HMH). The team was providing medical care at a mobile clinic and at an orphanage at Croix de Bouquet, a town near the capital city of Port-au-Prince and the international airport.
| For updated information on the Diocese of Madison’s collection for Catholic Relief Services aid to Haiti, click here | |
Charles is making a determined effort for donations. “Our work now is to raise funds. I’ve seen the need in Haiti. I’m trying to help get the message out the best I can that money is needed so the children in the orphanage can have a better life.”
HMH is a non-profit Christian group founded by Madison nurse Jennifer Weitzel Blahnik. Her sister, Sarah Weitzel Cain, an imaging technician at Beloit Memorial Hospital, assists with the ministry. Both are Beloit natives. Also with the group was Mary Parry, Beloit, serving as a support person, and two nurses from Madison.
