FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE (ANS) -- As the international community commemorates World Polio Day and the race to eradicate polio worldwide, one organization is making a real difference.

Mercy Ships’ New Steps center in Freetown continues to give a leg up to those who contracted the disease during the decade of conflict in the nation when immunizations were sporadic.

With a Sierra Leonean team assisted by international professional volunteers, New Steps provides a range of otherwise unavailable services to more than 30 communities.

“Living in a community of people facing similar challenges can provide individuals with the support they need to learn a skill and earn a living,” said Sierra Leonean Ibrahim Bangura, in a news release. He suffered from polio as a child and serves as New Steps Deputy Director.

Mercy Ships New Steps provides services in rehabilitation, health care services, a school integration program, as well as personal and community development.

Thousands of Sierra Leone’s polio-disabled still grapple with the challenges of sustaining life and finding work in a country that finds itself at the bottom of the Human Development Index.

According to a news release from Mercy Ships, for 17-year-old Mariatu, that challenge was even more difficult without opportunity for an education due to the polio she contracted when she was only a few years old. Her legs crippled, she dragged herself around on her knees.

Not long after Mariatu’s father was killed in the war, her mother became sick and died as well. Mariatu, her sister and three brothers were taken in by an aunt who brought her to the Mercy Ships New Steps Center in Freetown.

According to Mercy Ships, five years ago, New Steps volunteers fitted her with calipers and crutches to help her walk upright instead of crawl. A wheelchair gave her mobility around home. She was also able to attend her first classes at the age of 12, assisted by the New Steps staff who helped her school adapt to disabled student needs.

Now in her second year of junior secondary school, Mariatu lives in a community with other polio-affected women: The Polio Women and Girls Development Organization. These 25 women live together and support each other through tailoring and handcrafts. Mariatu does embroidery.

Other women have been helped with micro-enterprise sewing projects and the polio-disabled men in a community nearby have a blacksmithing business. Mercy Ships said that both communities have been helped by mobility devices from New Steps.

For Mariatu, mobility aids made all the difference. She uses her Personal Energy Transportation device (PET) to get to school, parks it outside the school building, and uses her crutches to get in and around the classroom.

“I always keep very busy with my work,” she said in the news release. Before I met Mercy Ships, she recalled, “I did nothing. All day…nothing. I walked on my knees. Now I can stand. They have done a really wonderful thing for me.”

Mercy Ships said that according to the UNDP Human Development Index (2006), only 35 percent of Sierra Leone’s population over 15 years of age is literate. Among those with physical disabilities the literacy rate is even lower,

Since 2001, the Mercy Ships Sierra Leone School Integration Program has assimilated 1,663 disabled children into public schools. Originated in cooperation with the support of the Child Protection Unit of UNICEF, this program is now run solely by New Steps Sierra Leone. This year alone, the physical and social integration program will insure the attendance of more than 400 disabled children into more than 100 schools.

With polio cases at an all-time low in West Africa, Mercy Ships reported that countries are renewing their commitment to eliminate the crippling polio virus all together. Still, 90 percent of the world’s polio cases are still found in Africa, according to the WHO.

According to UNICEF, Sierra Leone is one of the few West African countries which has kept to a timetable to eradicate polio, beginning their vaccinations to children in 1998 in the middle of the civil war. There has been no confirmed case of the wild polio virus there since 2001.

The initiative to eradicate polio began in 1988 and is one of the largest public private partnerships in history with the WHO, UNICEF, Rotary International and the CDC in the US. A highly infectious virus, polio invades the nervous system and can cause paralysis within hours.

There is no cure for polio; it can only be prevented. In 2006, only four countries in the world remained polio-endemic, down from more than 125 in 1988.

About Mercy Ships Sierra Leone

Founded in 1978 as a global charity by Don and Deyon Stephens, Mercy Ships brings hope and healing to the poor in developing nations.

Recognizing a huge need in Sierra Leone after visits of their hospital ship, Mercy Ships established a land-based center in Freetown January 2000. Mercy Ships New Steps Center addresses rehabilitation and community development needs of the nation's disabled through physical rehabilitation, healthcare, personal development and community development services.

Initially, skilled technicians worked out of a workshop built into a 40-foot seagoing cargo container delivered by a Mercy Ship. By 2005, a purpose-built New Steps Center increased services. In keeping with Mercy Ships goals of sustainable community development, most of the staff are Sierra Leone nationals, supported by international volunteers assisting short term. Occupational therapists, physical therapists and others are needed to support training programs for national staff.

For more information go to www.mercyships.org/site/c.ehKHI0PJIqE/b.2735045/k.9502/Sierra_Leone.htm

Jeremy Reynalds is a freelance writer and the founder and director of Joy Junction, New Mexico's largest emergency homeless shelter, http://www.joyjunction.org or http://www.christianity.com/joyjunction. He has a master's degree in communication from the University of New Mexico, and a Ph.D. in intercultural education from Biola University in Los Angeles. His newest book is "Homeless in the City: A Call to Service." Additional details about "Homeless" are available at http://www.HomelessBook.com He lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico. For more information contact: Jeremy Reynalds at jeremyreynalds@comcast.net. Tel: (505) 877-6967 or (505) 400-7145. Note: A higher resolution JPEG picture of Jeremy Reynalds is available on request from Dan Wooding at danjuma1@aol.com.