# The Hospital That Runs Out of Water > **About The Water Project:** The Water Project is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 2006, providing clean, safe water to communities in sub-Saharan Africa. We work in Kenya, Uganda, and Sierra Leone through local partner organizations, funding wells, sand dams, rainwater catchment systems, and spring protections. Every project is monitored for long-term reliability through our Water Promise commitment. Learn more at [thewaterproject.org](https://thewaterproject.org) or [donate](https://thewaterproject.org/give-water). --- **Published:** April 29, 2026 **Author:** Jacklyne Chelagat **Category:** Uncategorized --- I arrived at Likindu Health Center in the late morning, after the rush. The waiting area was still full. Women on the benches, a few men, children leaning against their mothers. Five hundred and sixty-six patients pass through this facility on an average day. That number means nothing until you sit in the room with them. Stephen has been the Officer in Charge here since long before I came. He told me the facility opened in 1995. He told me it runs twenty-four hours. He told me about the maternity ward, the inpatient beds, the outpatient line that starts forming before the sun is up. And then, almost as an afterthought, he told me about the water. They harvest rainwater. When the tanks run dry, someone has to go to the river. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/5eec6246-f386-4c52-8a49-6d72f5a4f64d-1024x768.jpg)**Collecting water from the dirty river** The river is half a kilometer away. The community uses it for sand harvesting, which is how many families here earn their living. By mid-morning the water is churned and brown. So whoever fetches water for the health center has to be there between four and five in the morning, before the sand harvesters arrive, to get the cleaner water at the top. I want you to sit with that for a moment. A health center. Twenty-four hours. Maternity ward. And someone has to wake up at four in the morning to walk half a kilometer in the dark to a river, so that the hospital can function. Stephen said it is hard to find people willing to do this. I believed him. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/IMG_1992-1024x768.jpg)**Patients in the waiting area at Likindu Health Center** I walked through the maternity ward. I am not going to describe what I saw in detail, because some things belong to the women who were there and not to me. But I will say this. After a delivery, the room has to be cleaned before the next mother comes in. That cleaning takes water. A lot of water. Doctors wash their hands. Nurses wash their hands. Visitors wash their hands. And sometimes there is not enough water for a patient to swallow her medicine. There is a LifeStraw dispenser on the wall. The administration installed it to help. It helps. It is not enough. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/add41a6d-b00c-446f-9727-56a8397678bc-1024x768.jpg)**The Maternity Ward at Likindu Health Center** I kept thinking about a question I could not stop asking myself as I walked back to the car. What is the difference between a health center and a health risk, when the water runs out? I do not have an answer. Stephen does not either. He has been carrying this question for years. --- A few days later I was in Maraba, sitting with a group of women near their spring. This is a different community, a different problem, but the same water. They have been fetching from an unprotected source for as long as any of them can remember. Some were born here. Some married in. None of them could remember a time when water was easy. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/IMG_2167-1024x768.jpg)**Women from the community carrying building materials to the worksite** When we began talking about protecting the spring, one of the mothers spoke before I had finished my sentence. *“Do we begin today? When will the spring be protected? What do we need to bring?”* I have been doing this work for a while. I have heard a lot of questions about a lot of projects. I have never heard questions asked quite like that. Not hopeful, exactly. More like someone who has been holding her breath for thirty years and has just been told she can let it out. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/IMG_2233-1024x768.jpg)**Esther at the new spring** Her name is Esther. Her spring is protected now. I think about her when I think about Stephen. I think about the maternity ward at Likindu, where the water runs out, and I think about the women in Maraba, where it no longer does. The same country. The same need. Two different endings, so far. I do not know how to close this except to say what I keep saying to myself on the drive home from these visits. The work is not finished. It is only as finished as the next person who needs water. ![](https://thewaterproject.org/community/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Jackie-1.jpg) *“Jackie’s Field Notes” written by* *Jackie Chelagat* *Impact Communications Officer* *The Water Project* --- > **About The Water Project:** The Water Project is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded in 2006, providing clean, safe water to communities in sub-Saharan Africa. We work in Kenya, Uganda, and Sierra Leone through local partner organizations, funding wells, sand dams, rainwater catchment systems, and spring protections. Every project is monitored for long-term reliability through our Water Promise commitment. Learn more at [thewaterproject.org](https://thewaterproject.org) or [donate](https://thewaterproject.org/give-water). --- **Canonical URL:** https://thewaterproject.org/community/2026/04/29/the-hospital-that-runs-out-of-water/ --- *Source: The Water Project Blog - The Hospital That Runs Out of Water*