Father Themi Adamopolous, who fought the Ebola disease outbreak in Africa, has made West Africa his adopted home.
Apart from challenging a virus which has killed nearly 4,000 people, he has also been offering support and refuge to the African albinos of the wider areas of Sierra Leone, Malawi and Tanzania.
Albinos – people and animals who lack the tyrosinase enzyme – are thought to have magical powers and are stigmatised, hunted down for their organs and body parts or even killed.
Father Themis has included albinos in his Greek Orthodox mission, offering education, scholarships and jobs and demanding equal rights via the Sierra Leone Albino Association (SLAA).
Baraka Cosmas Lusambo, a five-year-old albino boy, is one of the many children who had to leave their family and live in hiding after a group of men broke into his family’s home, hit his mother unconscious and cut off his right hand to sell it on the black market.
Baraka Cosmas’ heartbreaking story was published last March, attracting attention from international media.
Elissa Montanti, founder of the Global Medical Relief Fund which helps children from crisis zones access custom prostheses, read his story, and decided to act.
With Cosmas Baraka, another five children from the refuge home were transferred to New York’s Staten Island, where Montanti’s charity is located, in order to have the prostheses fitted at Philadelphia’s Shriners Hospital for Children.
Ms Montani, who has grown close to Baraka, told reporters that the five have become her adopted children.
She also stressed that even though the children aren’t getting their limbs back, “they are getting something that is going help them lead a productive life and be part of society and not be looked upon as a freak, or that they are less than whole”.