Lui Hospital and the beginning of a modern health system in the Greater Mundri Counties
In Greater Mundri, erstwhile Amadi District, the Lui Hospital and modern health system came into being as from 1921. Dr. Kenneth Grant Fraser (Scottish), his wife Eileen Charlotte Fraser (Irish) and his sister-in-law Alice Galbraith (Irish) were members of the Church Missionary Society (CMS). Their coming to Lui was inspired early in their lives before they were married.
For Dr. Fraser it was the ambition to emulate Dr David Livingstone, the famous missionary doctor, who gave his life to healing Africans in southern Africa. For Eileen it was to fulfil a childhood dream of teaching black African children. This story covers their pioneer works in the introduction of modern medicine to a health system in Greater Mundri, together with their successors until the hospital was taken over by the Sudan Government in 1958.
After qualifying in their respective fields, they were married but before they could settle down as a couple they had to go to the war, the World War I. Fraser as a medic in Turkey and Eileen as a volunteer nurse in France. After the War, Fraser specialized as a surgeon and both joined the CMS and went to the Sudan. Before sailing Fraser succeeded obtained medical equipment and medicines from friends sufficient to start healing immediately.
In the Sudan they were directed by the missionary-in-charge to go and start work in Amadi District (Moru land) which fell in the CMS Sphere of Operation but had had no missionary activity. In the District they arrived at Lui, the village of Sub-chief Yilu on 22 December 1920. At the time of their arrival there were still no roads, except tracks; no schools; no health service in the District and therefore modern western medicine was unheard. The subsequent story relies heavily on the book by Mrs. Eileen Fraser “The Doctor Comes to Lui.”
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