We’d like to share this customer testismonal with you from Bill Horan, President of Operation Blessing International. Bill leads one of many relief efforts in Haiti with a focus on delivering clean drinking water. He is using our eXact Micro 7+ and Chlorine photometers for field testing.

Port-au-Prince Haiti

Dear Ivars,

It was such a great pleasure meeting you and your team in Chicago. I especially appreciated the time you and your family members spent to explain the details of your products and the testing process.

I am in Haiti now at the end of a 12-day trip. I have been using the Chlorine tester every day in a variety of ways. The photos (feel free to use them) attached were taken at Zanmi Beni, a home for disabled orphans that we operate along with Partners in Health (www.pih.org). The test equipment has enabled us to fine tune the chlorine content that we inject into the well water that supplies the children’s home. I’m happy to report that we have it holding at 2.2ppm. No more guessing games trying to determine what shade of blue the test strips are…I love it!

The other two photos were taken today at Zanmi Beni Children’s Home when David Darg (OBI Director of Disaster Relief) was testing the water therapy pool for chlorine content. Today’s test revealed that our Haitian maintenance guy had inadvertently turned off the chlorine feed.

The other evening I was in Port-au-Prince visiting a displaced persons camp. My friend Dr Marhone (Haiti’s Director of Nutrition) who lost her home in the quake is living in the camp and running a field clinic there. As I was getting ready to leave, she asked me to please “test the camp water.” She explained that Caritas was delivering water to a bladder storage tank in the camp, and that the last two times she drank from it, she suffered from diarrhea. I pulled a sample, brought it to our HQ and filled one of the coliform EZ test bottles that you sent me. I placed the sample on a window sill in the direct sun, and about 24 hours later, it turned DARK blue! I had also run a chlorine test and learned that there was only a trace (.02) of chlorine in the water.

I reported test results to Dr Marhone as well as to Bill Clinton’s UN Office of the Special Envoy to Haiti. I pointed out that the contaminated water was especially dangerous because of the camp resident’s “perception of purity.”

Caritas is a highly trusted organization in Haiti. Mothers have so much faith in Caritas that they give the water to their infants and children. I don’t have to tell you what happens next…disease at best, and all too often, death of the very young.

My complaint, backed up by detailed test results, brought an immediate response from Caritas. I havent been back to get another sample, but am confident that the camp water is now contains safe levels of chlorine.

Thanks again for the short course on testing!

All the best,

Bill Horan

President

Operation Blessing International

www.ob.org