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Fighting The War On Malaria Worldwide
The Dictionary defines grassroots as ordinary people: the ordinary
people in a community or the ordinary members of an organization, as
opposed to the leadership”.
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A BIT OF HISTORY
In 2002, I wrote Skeeter
Beaters, Memories of the South Pacific because I felt strongly
that it was a story that had to be told. Through contacts developed
over the years, I was told a horrifying story of malaria and its
effects on ordinary people just like you and I. I was also told a
story of a small group of men who successfully battled that disease to
a standstill in just 3-1/2 years. Uplifting? Yes, but I was left with
one yet to be answered question - why is malaria the number one killer
of children in the world today if, 68 years ago, a handful of men
could do so much with so little to overcome its damaging effects?
And so I learned there truly is an important lesson to be learned from
our history. It is the link you and I share with the grassroots
movement started by the US Navy volunteer group nicknamed Skeeter
Beater and the first successful malaria control effort that they
launched in the South Pacific. It was in 1942, that 8 medical and
engineering personnel embarked on an eradication and control program
in the Solomon Islands that in just three and a half years grew to
over 2,500 men and women and spread to hundreds of islands all over
the Pacific. At the end of the war in 1945, it was this grassroots
movement that had successfully reduced malarial casualties in the
Pacific by 98%.
Today, my goal with THE SKEETER BEATERS FOUNDATION is to give
Americans of all ages a rallying point around a real, living, historic
connection to the modern war on malaria that continues to affect over
50% of the world’s entire population. THE SKEETER BEATERS FOUNDATION
will bring closure to the sacrifice of the original Skeeter Beaters
while providing an example for a new grassroots movement that will be
as successful today as it was in 1942.
Thank you for your support!
Dennis Cline
Littleton, Colorado |
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