Dear Friends and Supporters,

We have now been in Zimbabwe for 9 days, and they have been full to the maximum.  We arrived on July 20th, and the next day 3 doctors and their families, a total of 10 of us, started work at the Richard Morris Eye Hospital in Bulawayo. We were joined by Dr. Bothun, Professor of pediatric ophthalmology at Mayo Clinic, Dr. Faruk Orge from Case Western in Cleveland, Ohio and his father, Professor Yavosk Orge, retired as chairman at Istanbul University in Turkey all worked in surgery both in performing pediatric eye surgery and teaching to training doctors. We also spent a day at a rural eye camp in the southern part of Zimbabwe, then we all drove about 600 miles in a day to Victoria Falls where the four of us gave presentations at the Zimbabwe Ophthalmic Congress.

We have just arrived back in Bulawayo this evening, and we will be performing surgery on children with surgical problems with their eyes again tomorrow. It has been a joy to see the faces of the parents when they see their children safely through eye surgery. We have about 18 more of these children who are operative candidates, so we pray that God will give us the strength, stamina and skills to complete them with no problems.

Zimbabwe had its national presidential elections today, so we are praying for peace and for responsible and transparent government. The people here are so very patient, but they have suffered for many years under the previous rule of Mugabe, so we hope for peace and prosperity to come to this hurting country.

I have a long list of patients who want to see me, and we also have several eye camps planned. One of these is planned to last for 3 days and we have heard that their are about 400 surgical cases waiting for us, so we need our sleep before that camp begins.

Thank you for your prayers for us that we will be lights and comfort to so many here who are suffering. We will write soon again and keep you up to date of our work here. We appreciate the opportunity to share with you.

Steve and Jane Beaty