By: Sr. Ma. Loreta G. Jamelarin, ICM

I am an I.C.M. sister from Iloilo. I arrived in Cameroon in 1980. For the moment, I am in the same community as Sr. Emma de Guzman. People here in Cameroon give me different titles because of my present work. Up in the North, they gave me the title: “Doctor of the plants”; in other places, “Sister herbalist”; here “la petite sorciere”-the little Sorceress. Why all these titles? Just because I try to teach Medicinal Plants, making the people aware of the benefits they can derived from them when they are deprived of health care because of the crisis situation the country is experiencing now.

No scar Needed

Early one morning, Sister called: “Come and see if you can do something to help the baby of Emillience”. I looked at the baby with a swollen face due to an abscess, “Have you been to the dispensary?” I asked the mother but. “Yes, but they told me to let it ripen first and then they will make an incision.” Imagining the sleepless nights the baby and the mother had endured, and my repugnance at seeing a big scar on the face of such a cute baby, I did some mental gymnastics to find out appropriate plants to give in order to hasten the cure of abscesses without opening them.. I took a cabbage leaf, some gumamela buds, and gulasiman plants, crushed them all together to make a paste, and applied it to the abscess. I gave more materials to the mother, encouraged her to continue faithfully the treatment at home using a hot compress. Within a week’s time, the abscess naturally healed without incision or any expense.