Paperwork snafu almost cancels Jamaican medical trip

A medical mission trip to Jamaica was nearly canceled three days before the volunteers were to arrive on the island.

A team of 39 people, including doctors, a dentist, nurses and respiratory therapists, has been making plans for several months to operate a medical clinic in Carron Hall, Jamaica.

They are scheduled to arrive in Jamaica on Monday.

But a delay in their paperwork nearly put a halt to that trip Friday.

The Jamaican embassy in Washington, D.C., told the volunteers that they needed approval from the Ministry of Labor before they could enter the country. Until that approval comes, the volunteers cannot enter Jamaica; their visas are still in Washington, D.C., at the embassy office.

The catch is that the paperwork likely won't be ready until Monday morning, the day when the volunteers are set to board a plane for Jamaica. And the additional documentation only applies to health-care professionals. All the other volunteers already received the necessary approval.

"This has been a roller coaster," said Dorinda Abbott, a member of Evangelical United Church of Christ in Cape Girardeau.

Nearly every possible contact has been made trying to find out how to get the paperwork complete before their departure, she said.

Got official's home number

And it wasn't until after 5 p.m. Friday that the final OK came from Jamaican officials. Gwen Maloney, one of the trip organizers, had placed calls to nearly everyone she could think of with a contact in Jamaica, including U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson's office.

Finally, Maloney talked a Jamaican official into giving her the home phone number of the official who heads the Ministry of Labor. She called him, and he said it would be OK for the volunteers to come. They'll receive their visas and the completed paperwork after they arrive in Jamaica on Monday.

The paperwork snafu is a first for the volunteers, who make the trip to Jamaica every other year.

On previous trips, health-care workers didn't need the additional approval, Maloney said. They were always approved for the clinics by the Ministry of Health. And that approval has come for this year's trip.

Maloney said she explained to the embassy workers in Washington that no one is paid to do this and that the people have spent nearly $20,000 in plane tickets to come to Jamaica.

She even asked if the volunteers could just enter the country and then the embassy could send the visas there. "They've had our passport paperwork for almost three months and we've never gotten a letter stating that we had to have this," Maloney said.

ljohnston@semissourian.com

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