LAKOTA AID - A Registered Charity No: 1097444

Garvard Good Plume

Garvard Good Plume is Oglala/Lakota, 52 years old and lives on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, (South Dakota, U.S.A), at Wolf Creek. He is one of my main contacts for Pine Ridge and a true survivor. He works tirelessly with a group pf people called Defenders of the Black Hills

www.defendblackhills.org

founded by another true survivor Charmaine White Face.

Garvard lives in a little wooden house that was his late father’s, and his mother and younger brother live a short walk away in their own little home. He is desperately trying to repair his house and any donations towards this would be a big help.

Garvard has diabetes and heart problems and recently had to have emergency surgery to remove his gall bladder, which turned out to have become badly infected, and without this operation, he was literally hours away from death. It was only discovered because he had an existing appointment at the hospital for a routine diabetic check up.

Where he lives on the reservation it is about a two hour drive to the main hospital in Rapid City. There is a hospital in Pine Ridge town, a few miles away from Wolf Creek , where Garvard lives, but this hospital does not do major surgery . Emergency cases have to be either flown in by helicopter, which is only used in extreme cases because of cost, or the person has to somehow make their own way to the hospital in Rapid City and hope they get their in time. Again cost is a major factor here, rising fuel prices make life increasingly difficult and if you cannot put fuel in your car, then you are stuck!

This is an example of how things are for the Lakota people on the Pine Ridge reservation. Many families live in very remote areas of this vast reservation. It is approx 11,000 square miles and a beautiful, but very barren and unforgiving land. If Garvard had not already been in Rapid City when he took really ill, then it is quite possible that he would not have made it from Pine Ridge to Rapid City in time.

I have been on several trips to Pine Ridge now, over the past 6 years. I have been trying to research into the conditions on the reservation in many areas, such as health care, infant mortality, the acute diabetes and alcohol problems and related illnesses, and also the way in which the Native American War Veterans are treated . They fought in the world wars, plus Vietnam and Korea, and many are in Afghanistan and Iraq defending their country. There is also a major problem with the pollution that has been leaching out of the many Uranium test pits in the Dakotas from the 50’s onwards, that were left open and no clean up done , and the leaching of radioactive substances into the environment having caused massive health problems, such as rare cancers, because of this.

It is very difficult to do proper research without being over in South Dakota on more frequent occasions and for longer lengths of time, all because of lacks of funds on my part.

I try and get monies sent over to the people via my ‘Help The Elders’ scheme on my website which is working quite well, but so much more needs to be done.

The people are in dire need of help, many living in third world conditions and the research into the area’s mentioned earlier would prove invaluable I feel in getting the message out into the world about just how bad things are for the people and to try and get more help and sponsorships out there to make life more bearable for them.

On the subject of sponsorship, help towards my airfares would be wonderful, enabling me to get back to Pine Ridge more often to be able to do the research needed here. If anyone can help towards my travel expenses this would be wonderful. Any donations would be very gratefully received for this so if you wish to help then please contact me via my website , and also on behalf of any help for Garvard Good Plume

www.lakota-aid.co.uk

Thank you for reading this and to all the people that have helped in the past and are still continuing to help.

Written by Brenda Aplin- June 08.