BB-2-ggg
[Peoples Temple letterhead]
3 August, 1978
The Honorable Forbes Burnham
Prime Minister
Public Buildings, Brickdam
Georgetown
Dear Prime Minister Burnham;
We in Peoples Temple are anxious to help in any way we can in the surrounding region and we are reaching out to people there everyday with medical assistance. We have a young twelve yearold Amerindian boy who was brought to us with glaucoma. He had an injury to his eye and glaucoma developed. We sent him at our expense to Georgetown where he stayed at our headquarters. The opthamologist said that he would have to have a cornea transplant and it couldn’t be done in Guyana. Most of the time we have been able to take care of people that come to us for help but this would be too expensive.
We are asking the United States to help but they are very slow and rarely help in situations like this. We asked the GDR Embassy but they said we should write a letter and they couldn’t promise anything, but this too would be a very slow proceedure. We want to help this young boy and this is the right time for the surgery to be done.
We feel like we are Guyanese nationals and try to live in every way to demonstrate this. We are just desperate on this situation. You really begin to wonder who is a socialist and who isn’t when it comes to something like a young boy’s future.
Our boat is now being used to make the regular run from Port Kaituma to Mabaruma because the Daemon is not functioning at this time. This is done every week at a great expense to us because we pay for all the expenses and we have been doing this for several weeks.
If any help can be given to this young Amerindian boy, we would be very grateful.
Cooperatively yours,
Sharon Amos
Administrative Assistant to Cde. Jim Jones
cc: Honorable Deputy Prime Minister Ptolemy Reid
Honorable Minister Vibert Mingo