Health clinic in Bafia Gouffan

We have an ambitious goal: Everyone in the Mbam-et-Inobou area should have access to adequate medical care, allowing them to improve their quality of life and life expectancy..

Currently, healthcare in this area is inadequate. The generally predominant hygiene and environmental conditions are poor and are made even worse in Bafia due to the nearby, unclean Mbam river, which also serves as a drinking water supply. The people suffer from numerous infectious illnesses and are often sick, meaning they cannot regularly earn a living and children cannot regularly attend school. Inadequate primary care without sufficient wound treatment leads to numerous, avoidable cases of illness. We want to change that!
And here is our plan:

We are helping our partner organization in Yaoundé, Assistance Germano-Camerounaise (Assistance Germano-Camerounaise) build a health clinic. We started construction on April 15, 2016 – follow our progress here

We are proud! A look at the health clinic makes our efforts worth it:

March 2017

The water tower is finished. So far, it has provided the construction site with water, and in the future, it will provide the medical clinic with fresh water:

        

The joy brought by the scaffolding provided by the company Franz van Stephoudt last year has peaked again:

      

The tower is about 4m (13.1 ft) tall and, once it is finished, 2 water tanks will be placed on the wooden platform on the top.

 

We are building a three-chamber septic tank to treat wastewater.

   

The ceiling lining is being placed in the medical center. You can see the space between the aluminum roof and the wood covering, which allows the air to circulate freely between the two layers, creating a more comfortable environment within the building..

 

 

The ceiling panels used are cut to size in the training center workshop:

   

Since they are sold as large panels:

 

And now the bars for the windows are also ready.

  

These bars and the scaffolding (a donation of goods from last year) are brought to the Bafia worksite from the training center in Yaoundé:

   

Just like the large front gate:

 

Beginning of February 2017

It’s time to start plastering the walls:

                                  

After the plumbing and electrical lines were placed:

End of January 2017

The large iron front gate is finished. Nobody who is not permitted to enter will come in, and nobody who is not (yet) allowed to go out will leave:

Whenever there is planing, there is plenty of sawdust and wood chips.

                    

January 2017

Everyone celebrated the new year, and now we are heading to the wood market to buy materials, since now we need to prepare windowframes and doorframes.

                         

December 20 – just one week later::

A full view of the rear party:

The round doors are a true challenge – a challenge we met:

A palm tree for the roofing ceremony December 18, 2016!

The people are celebrating with us! And the contractor offers food and drink for everyone:

It looks great!

The trapezoidal sheet metal has been screwed in:

Exhausted, but satisfied, the construction crew takes a well-deserved break:

December 13, 2016

The team and site manager Guy Dang worked over the weekend to finish the roof as quickly as possible. They can be proud of the results, just as we are:

 

 

Even the first sheets of trapezoidal sheet metal have been screwed in:

 

A short break…

…then back to work

 

End of November / start of December

The roof is being made to bear weight so that the roofers can work directly on the roof:

 

On sunny, 33°C (92° F) days, work has been progressing quickly since November 26, and the roof frame is being built:

 

 

                         

In the meantime, the trapezoidal sheet metal for the roof is also being prepared:

        

        

November 2016

Heavy rainfall, muddy roads, and tires bogged down in puddles put a bit of a halt to construction.

Mid October 2016

Construction continues with a lot a hard work.

Start of Oktober 2016

 

 

 

 

 

Start of September 2016

  

 

End of August 2016

Progress is quick, and the shell of the building is starting to take shape:

Occasionally we have a rainy day, but nobody is discouraged by this, and the masonry and inner walls are being built.

The inner walls do not have to be as thick because they are not weight-bearing.

We are also starting to do the first steps of preliminary work for the roof dome.

Start of August 2016

Another milestone: the foundation for the floor is being laid:

End of Juli 2016

In order to lay the foundation, the worksite needs a supply of water, and we need to build a small water tower:

July 2016:

The concrete for the foundation is being mixed: It is made up of cement, gravel, and sand (both rough-grain and fine-grain), and everything is mixed with water. We are currently mixing everything by hand, since there is no power for the concrete mixer (though hopefully only temporarily):

June 2016

Work continues, and the damp-proof membrane is being placed:

Eight weight-bearing pillars are prepared from large stones that are drying within a casing:

    

Simultaneously, bricks for the outer walls are being made by hand from a sand-cement mixture:

 

May 2016

The foundation has to be filled in:

The foundation is laid:

Using a wheel loader that we rented for a day, the driver made the plot arable, meaning the dirt was transported away and the construction plot was leveled:

 

 

 

 

 

April  2016

The construction site is about 400m (0.25 miles) inland from the N4 national road, which connects the capital Yaoundé with the city of Bafoussam, located 350 km (217 miles) to the north. Next, we need to make a path through the forest to our plot so that the worksite will be reachable: