When New Life Home Trust — an orphanage in Nairobi caring for around 80 infants and small children — needed more than a basic well or a chlorine solution, OneChild reached out to Healing Waters. Their borehole, drilled by Water for the World, provided water, but it wasn’t safe for some of the most vulnerable children imaginable. What they needed was a more advanced purification approach, one built to meet a difficult challenge.
This is where Healing Waters is often called upon: stepping into situations where simple filtration won’t work, where there is challenging water contaminants, or where infants and immunocompromised children require an even higher standard of safety. And in this case, Healing Water’s Research and Development Engineer, Dr. Jacob took the lead.
Designing a System Built for Babies
Months before the trip, Jacob engineered the full treatment system from Colorado — selecting components, planning flow rates, and creating a solution tailored specifically for the quality of the water coming out of the borehole. It had to be reliable, durable, and gentle enough for the youngest children. Once the design was complete, he and Hana prepared to deploy it directly on-site.
For Hana, who had been to many program locations but never taken part this deeply in an installation, the experience brought a new appreciation for what this work demands.
“You need such a mix of disciplines,” she shared. “Electrical work, structural decisions, figuring out how to mount and stabilize everything — there’s always some surprise you can’t plan for until you’re standing right there.”
Training Local Operators to Own the System
As Jacob and Hana began the installation, they also set out to train the orphanage’s operators — individuals who normally serve as groundskeepers and caretakers. Despite having no background in water purification, they picked up the system with surprising speed.
“They were eager,” Hana said. “They understood the responsibility — they would be the ones ensuring safe water for the babies.”
Jacob experienced something he’s seen in other countries as well: real ownership.
“Sometimes they’d push me aside and say, ‘Let me do it,’” he laughed. “As an engineer, it’s hard to watch someone else run your system, but it’s exactly what you want — confidence, pride, and the ability to keep things running long after you fly home.”
A System That Arrived Just in Time
Only days after the installation was complete, messages from the New Life Home Trust staff arrived — each one carrying a reminder of why this work matters.
“Today we rescued an 11-day-old baby girl… she arrived at a time when we finally have safe water — something that will directly impact her care from the beginning.”
Yvonne, New Life Home Trust
Soon after came another note:
“We rescued a 3-week-old baby boy… thanks to you and Hana, he arrived at a time when we can give him clean, safe water from his very first days.”
Yvonne, New Life Home Trust
The staff chose to name the two rescued infants in honor of Jacob and Hana — a deeply personal gesture that spoke to the impact the Healing Waters team had on the orphanage. It was their way of honoring the gift these children now had from their very first days: the simple but life-changing security of safe water.
A Small Project With Impact Beyond Its Size
This project demonstrated what Healing Waters is uniquely positioned to do: step into complex, difficult purification challenges where the solution needs more than a basic approach.
It equipped local operators with new skills and real ownership.
And most of all, it ensured that the smallest, most fragile children in this orphanage now have safe water to drink, bathe in, and grow with — from their very first days of life.
Sometimes the impact of a system like this shows up in data and flow rates.
And sometimes it shows up in the name of a newborn who will grow up nourished by safe water living reminders of what goodness and grace can look like when safe water reaches those who need it most.