Jody Ray

Writer | Multimedia Journalist

jodyray [at] protonmail [dot com]

Photo by Tofros.com on Pexels
Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly •

Bridging the Healthcare Gap: How Sick Pikin Helps Sierra Leone’s Children Access Lifesaving Treatments - Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly

In September 2021, a young girl from Sierra Leone boarded her first plane ride bound for New Delhi, India. She had been diagnosed with meningioma, a type of brain tumor that cannot be treated in her home country due to a lack of specialized neurosurgical care.For children in Sierra Leone, life-threatening conditions often become fatal due to limited access to advanced diagnostic tools and healthcare facilities. Without timely intervention, meningioma can compress the brain or spinal cord, leadin...
Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly •

In Sierra Leone, Nonprofits Are on the Frontline Against Mpox - Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly

In an October 31 briefing, the Africa Union’s health watchdog issued a warning about the continent’s ongoing mpox outbreak, which started in early 2022. “The situation is not yet under control, we are still on the upward trend generally,” stated Ngashi Ngongo from the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC).This follows the declaration in August by the World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, that “the upsurge of mpox in the Democra...
The Telegraph •

Inside Sierra Leone’s plan to end its reliance on foreign hospitals

When Isatu Isha Kamara’s teenage daughter developed a limp and began complaining of agonising pain in her hip, a race to find help began that took her all over Sierra Leone.Mabinty Paulina Bangura was battling Chronic Slipped Capital Femoral Epiphysis (SCFE), a rare, debilitating condition stemming from damage to the growth plate in the hip which causes the ball-like end of the femur to slip out of place.Unable to walk properly or attend school, Mabinty urgently needed surgery. But there was a p...
New Internationalist •

Sierra Leone's vanishing history

Built by formerly enslaved people, Freetown’s historic ‘bod oses’ now face an existential threat as foreign embassies move in. Jody Ray reports.  On a humid March morning this year, police officers came to the scenic Hill Station neighbourhood in Freetown, Sierra Leone to evict civil servants living in historic board houses. The government had announced months prior that residents would be relocated, and their houses demolished in order to build Turkish and Saudi Arabian embassies.  Sierra Leon...
Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly •

Medical Ship Docks in Sierra Leone for Free Surgeries and Training - Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly

Disclosure: The author is a journalist and has been serving as a volunteer writer in the Communications Department on board the Global Mercy since January 2024. In August 2024, the Global Mercy, the world’s largest civilian hospital ship, docked at the port of Freetown for a 10-month field service to provide surgical operations and educational training by invitation of the government of Sierra Leone.
The ship’s first patient after docking was a 32-year-old police officer living in Freetown who h...

A map to end malaria?

New vaccines offer hope in the fight against this deadly disease but there are still challenges to overcome. New Humanist joined the vaccine rollout in Sierra Leone to find out moreIt’s the start of the rainy season in Sierra Leone, the west African country known for its beautiful beaches and tropical rainforests. The coming of the rains brings relief from the heat, but also something else: mosquitoes. While Sierra Leone suffers all through the year, the rainy seasons are the worst for mosquito-...
The Telegraph •

Sierra Leone gets first doses of a malaria vaccine – but with major challenges ahead

It has been a little over a month since World Malaria Day, when Sierra Leone’s President, Julius Maada Bio, addressed the nation in its fight against malaria with a landmark vaccination campaign. Since then, Sierra Leone’s Ministry of Health and UNICEF have been busy rolling out the first 550,000 doses of the new vaccine to the furthest corners of the country. The vaccine RTS,S/AS01 – commercial name Mosquirix – is made by GlaxosmithKline (GSK) and is the first for two pioneering malaria jabs no...
Bean to Barstool •

The Ghosts of New Orleans: Finding non-alcoholic options in a city known for excess.

Issue 05 of Final Gravity, a zine that shares immersive and personal stories from the world of beer, is now available for preorder.

Final Gravity tells the stories that don’t often make it into the pages of glossy beer mags, the stories that together weave the fabric of the collective beer experience.

The Ghosts of New Orleans by Jody Ray—Finding non-alcoholic options in a city known for excess.
Thrillist •

The Case for Visiting Sierra Leone Before Everyone Else Does

Bimbola Carroll’s office sits in a historic building in Freetown, Sierra Leone, overlooking a highway in the northern part of the city. Below, swarms of motorbikes and rattling kekehs (Sierra Leone’s version of the tuk tuk) swerve through pricey imported SUVs and brightly colored, beaten-up taxis—an ever-changing display of the city’s socio-economic divisions. “How are you finding Sierra Leone?” Carroll, or Bims, as he’s affectionately known, asks me. Carroll owns and operates Visit Sierra Leone

Kenyan Courts Keep Telling Meta to Let Workers Unionize

Last year Kenyan courts filed three lawsuits against Meta, Facebook’s parent company, for its unwillingness to work with organized labor. Workers sued Meta, which used third-party companies to facilitate content moderation in Kenya, for failing to provide adequate pay, training, or health care for employees who are regularly required to watch images of rape, murder and torture. In violation of Kenyan law, subcontractors working for Meta fired workers who attempted to unionize last year. When the

The Niger Coup Risks Opening Another Front in the West’s War With Russia

On July 26, a splinter faction of the Niger military overthrew President Mohamed Bazoum, confining him to the presidential palace. While telecommunications infrastructure was still intact, a tweet from the premier’s office claimed Bazoum and family were in good health but were prepared to call upon the National Guard to attack if the rebelling soldiers did not back down.

Within forty-eight hours, Colonel Amadou Abdramane, surrounded by nine other officers, took control of national airwaves, dec

How Tunisia Became the EU’s Border Guard

The European Union has struck a deal with the Tunisian government to quell migration coming to European shores. What has been termed a “strategic partnership” after weeks of talks between the two governments has resulted in $1.12 billion to Tunisia to rescue its fledgling economy and bail out debts to directly deal with a growing migrant crisis.

While the funds are contingent on specific economic reforms, human rights groups have sounded the alarm that the European taxpayer money is funding the
Country Roads Magazine •

How to Make West African Okra Stew

I’m pleased to report that Western-style supermarkets remain a rare enough phenomenon in Cotonou, Benin’s largest city. While I was there, I did eventually find one—all boxed away from the public with security guards at the entrance. This is where I got my quick fixes of frozen pizza, Pringles, Coca-Cola products—things shipped in from other countries at a premium.

For everything else, though, I ventured to the sprawling chaos of Dantokpa Market, the largest open-air market in West Africa.

As

Meta Is Trying, and Failing, to Crush Unions in Kenya

Meta is in hot water with Kenyan courts after three suits brought against it in the last year highlight its unwillingness to work with organized labor for better working conditions.

Last December, two Ethiopian researchers brought suit against Meta, the parent company of Facebook, for failing to adequately moderate extreme and violent content during the ongoing Tigray War, a devastating internal conflict in Ethiopia that has since left over six hundred people dead.

The researchers, Fisseha Tek
The Daily Beast •

Climbers Flock to ‘Cathedral of Limestone’ That's Actually a Giant Graveyard

“Mora mora” is what they say in Malagasy, the national language of Madagascar, to remind you to “take it easy” or to “take it slow”. I found similar double-repetition phrases for the same meaning traveling through East Africa—“Pole Pole” in Swahili, “Kes bi kes” in Amharic.

You’ve got to take it easy when traveling through this part of the world. One wrong move could result in a nasty fall. That was certainly the advice of the guide who helped point out exactly where the best footing was while
TravelMag •

The Source of Gumbo: Searching Benin for the Origins of Louisiana's Signature Stew

In Louisiana, everyone knows gumbo. Cajuns and creoles alike are raised on the rice-based dish filled with chicken, sausage, crawfish, and shrimp; and many share generations’ worth of memories of their respective grandmothers stirring up these ingredients in large metal pots on well-loved kitchen stoves. Few among us, though, know the dish’s origins, which stretch back across the centuries and the Atlantic to the west coast of Africa.

I had been told how in the second half of the 1600s, slaves
BBC •

Gumbo's long journey from West Africa

Fried cheese was the last thing I thought I'd see going into a traditional West African dish, but especially into an okra stew. It was just one of several ingredients that surprised me as a Louisiana-born Cajun who cut his teeth on gumbo, a pillar of southern Louisiana cuisine that's made up of seafood or meat cooked in a roux – but never with cheese.

The origins of Louisiana gumbo can be traced to West Africa, during a time when enslaved Africans brought okra (or gombo as it is known in region
The Daily Beast •

How This ‘Most Dangerous’ African Tribe Cleverly Fools Tourists

When the rainy season finishes, a few tourists head into the south of Ethiopia, close to the borders with Kenya and South Sudan. They’re searching for one of the last African tribes that pierce and gauge their lips with large decorative plates. These people are called the Mursi, and for years a handful of the most popular travel magazines photographed them adorning gorgeous lip plates, cattle horns, sticks and bones, berries and leaves, and other foliage.

The tourists want to see in real life w
The Daily Beast •

Voodoo Hub Thrives With Love Potions and Curse Spells Galore

LOMÉ, Togo—For at least half of Togo’s population of 2.5 million, Vodun, or Voodoo, is a way of life. European colonialism and post-colonial autocracies failed to fully suppress the religion and its rituals—which include elaborate esoteric dances, secret languages, and animal sacrifices dedicated to the many Vodun gods.

Today, the continued existence of Vodun is celebrated with the Fête du Vaudou in Benin, the birthplace of Vodun, each January.

But as I travelled through Togo, it was clear Vod

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