CBM Ireland

CBM Ireland is part of CBM International (founded 1908) an NGO which has over 1,000 projects in over 100 countries. It is the largest NGO working with children and adults with disabilities in the developing world. The work of CBM centres around prevention, treatment and cure.

Services provided are -

• Emergency humanitarian aid
• Medical intervention
• Surgery
• Education
• Community Based Rehabilitation (CBR), training and integration of people with disabilities into society
• Self help and micro credit to start up small business's
• Training of midwives in safe birthing techniques

These services are delivered through partnerships with mission organisations, national self help groups, national governments and local churches regardless of creed. CBM assists in the formulation of policy with the World Health Organisation.

Facts about CBM Ireland & World Blindness

• CBM is the leading international development organisation working with and behalf of people with disabilities in the poorest regions of the world.
• CBM's vision is to achieve an inclusive world in which all people with disabilities enjoy their human rights and achieve their full potential.
• CBM has 1,000 relief projects in over 100 countries and works together with more than 700 partners in developing countries.
• 90% of people who are blind live in the poorest parts of the developing world.
• 80% of blindness is treatable or preventable.
• Cataract is the single largest cause of blindness in the world and is responsible for half of world blindness, which represents around 18 million people. A 15 minute cataract operation costs just €30 for an adult and €120 for a child.
• River Blindness, caused by a parasitic worm spread by the blackfly, has infected 17 million people and another 40 million are at risk. The infection can be treated, but once blindness occurs, it is irreversible. One dose of Mectizan®, costing just €1 to provide (or €10 for a complete course), will halt the advance of blindness.
• Trachoma has claimed the sight of around six million people. Re-infection can occur many times, causing the eye lid to turn under, scarring the cornea with every painful blink. In time, the eye becomes so badly damaged that blindness is inevitable and irreversible. Trachoma quickly spreads through families and communities. It costs just €3 to provide enough Tetracycline eye ointment to treat a whole family.
• Vitamin A Deficiency can cause permanent blindness and has resulted in 1.5 million children losing their sight. This year an estimated 350,000 children will go blind. This can be prevented with two or three vitamin capsules per year. Each tablet costs 45cent. CBM distributed over 1,265,000 vitamin A tablets last year.
• Vision 2020: the Right to Sight has as its goal, the eradication of all preventable and curable blindness by the year 2020. In 1997 the World Health Organisation (WHO) recognised CBM as a professional agency in the prevention of blindness. CBM concentrates on performing cataract operations, the control of eye infections and prevention of childhood blindness as well as training for eye care personnel. CBM is proud to be a founding member of this global partnership. For more information about Vision 2020 please visit www.v2020.org

David McAllister - Biography

I was born in the Belgian Congo in 1954 and spent the first 15 years of my life there. My parents were missionaries, my mother was a qualified mid-wife from the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast and my Dad was a qualified engineer from the ship yard. They went to Congo in 1952.

We lived in the forest region around Kisangani (Stanleyville) and my brother, sister and I grew up in the forest area were Stanley walked through. In fact the path he carved out of the jungle was still visible and certainly many of the old ones were full of stories, as we sat around the village fires, of the terrible times of Leopold. I saw many old people with missing ears, noses, hands etc. So I grew up in the area, and with the people, that suffered the terrible genocide and slavery of the late 1880's through to the early 1930's. In fact I have realized that I have personal experiences, or know first hand people with first hand experiences, of Congo from the 1880's through to 2004! (gosh I'm getting old)

During my first 15 years of life I lived in a mud house in the forest villages, went to American boarding school in Northern Congo set up for MK's (Missionary Kids). This is a kind of 3rd. culture group of kids that doesn't know exactly were they fit in to the world scene!

In 1960, when I was 6, we had a lot of trouble in the Stanleyville area due to the struggle for Independence. We were eventually evacuated out of Congo back to Ireland. Then again in 1964 there was a major rebellion and we were part of the hostage group taken by the rebels. There was a lot of killing, many of my friends (black and white) were killed, and we ourselves were shot at on several occasions. Some of my close friends (other MK's that I had gone to school with) were killed and wounded then. We were eventually rescued by mercenaries under the command of Major Mike Hoare and we returned to Ireland.

Then in 1967 we were the first whites to go back to the forest area around Kisangani and witnessed what, for me, was the first mass hunger and death situation in a population. My parents were able to help thousands of people, UN and other International Agencies were not active at that time in this area as there were still pockets of rebels in the forest areas.

I returned to Ireland during the summer of 1969, lived in the Old park area of Belfast and tried to get some "A" levels and eventually got in to Queens Uni. to study Agriculture, I was quite driven to return to Congo (Zaire by then) to work with the population to help develop good food growing systems. I guess the rebellion and subsequent suffering I witnessed in the 1960's had a lot to do with this.

Going to school and Uni in Belfast in the 1970's was also an experience as the Old park road area was in the middle of the "troubles" and it was a learning time to understand that the fighting I witnessed in Africa was not because of skin colour but, rather, a function of human nature.

After graduating from Queens I went to France for 2 years to study French, met my wife and we went to Zaire in 1982 and we worked in Africa until 2002.

I worked in private business as a Farm Manager in Rwanda and then joined various International Agencies as Director of Programmes. Latterly (since 1990) I have worked as the Regional Representative for CBM for West and Central Africa. It was during this time that I had to develop many emergency programme in CAR, Zaire/Congo, Rep. of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Liberia, Sudan. Many times I was the only foreigner able to move work in Congo as the rebel leaders recognised my unique "qualifications" having been born there, speaking the languages and understanding somewhat, the issues of the Congo situation. It was strange being part of the International NGO community yet being able to go in to places they could not.