[vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”” use_theme_fonts=”yes”][vc_single_image image=”121530″ img_size=”medium” add_caption=”yes” alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]If you missed the first part of Shokry’s story last week read it here.
02/16/2021 Washington D.C. (International Christian Concern) – “I go to school for 2 days a week and I go to center classes for 3 days a week and I work for 2 days a week in farms, so I can afford my expense and help my mother and my older brother because my father died,” Shokry summarizes his daily routines and strains.
Amidst ten-year-old Shokry’s struggle with balancing work, school and a stand-in parental figure in the absence of his father, he also suffers from many preventable medical issues. In June, a routine assessment with the child sponsorship program revealed that Shokry tested positive for an intestinal infection, worms, urinary crystals and anemia. At that time, he also suffered from bouts of diarrhea and constipation according to his mother. Hope House provided the necessary medicine for Shokry and when he tested again in November, he was negative for worms and anemia. When asking his mother about the family’s health she replied, “all of us are good, but Shokry suffers some pains because of Kidney stone disease. But I trust God that he will recover quickly.”[/vc_column_text][vc_custom_heading text=”Economic persecution pushes the children to experience medical issues and often forced neglect with limited access to the necessary solutions.” font_container=”tag:h5|text_align:left” use_theme_fonts=”yes” css=”.vc_custom_1613127432947{margin-top: 50px !important;margin-bottom: 60px !important;padding-right: 20px !important;padding-left: 20px !important;}”][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1613127456776{margin-bottom: 0px !important;}”]
These medical issues are routinely tested for as part of the child sponsorship program due to their prevalence among this Christian community. Though the program does provide monthly nutritional food packages, children still face medical implications regularly as a result of their poor nutritional diets. As Christians in Egypt suffer from economic persecution with higher unemployment rates, lower-paying jobs and fewer job opportunities, this leads them into poverty. Economic persecution pushes the children to experience medical issues and often forced neglect with limited access to the necessary solutions.
Hope House seeks to right these wrongs that originate in religious freedom abuses and indirect persecution that afflicts Christian families like Shokry’s. It is through the power of education that ICC hopes to see these Christian families rise up out of poverty and be alleviated from their economic persecution.
ICC will be highlighting one child from our sponsorship program over the next several weeks, some of whom are still available to sponsor. To learn more about ICC’s Hope House or sponsor a child like Shokry, visit this page.
For interviews please contact Alison Garcia: press@persecution.org
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