Vision Quest

S.B.’s Direct Relief International Brings Sight to
Salvadorans

by Sherry Villanueva

Fifty-five cents was all Rosalina needed. Fifty-five cents
for the bus so she could take her son to San Salvador, where a
doctor might be able to help him. The boy was eight years old, with
severely impaired motor and mental skills. He had not learned to
walk until he was four, and he had never spoken a word. He was a
burden for Rosalina, who loved her little boy but had five other
children to care for. She had no access to medical assistance in
her small village 60 miles northwest of San Salvador. She had no
real idea what was wrong with her son. Rosalina was very poor, she
supported her children on her own, and 55 cents represented a day’s
worth of food for her family.

When FUDEM (Fundación para el Desarrollo
de la Mujer) set up a mobile eye clinic in Rosalina’s town, she
brought the boy there with the hope of finding a doctor who could
“give him medicine to make him better.” What Rosalina did not
understand was that her son had been born with cerebral palsy, an
incurable condition. When Rosalina came to the clinic, she was met
by a team of norteamericanos, and I was one of them.