10 green bottles

Peter carefully measures out a bright green liquid, and then pours it into a line of plastic bottles, one by one. He is the pharmacy dispenser at Hospice Africa and his role is to mix this strangely coloured concoction each day. The liquid is morphine; Hospice Africa uses 90 litres each month to control the pain of patients in the terminal stages of cancer and AIDS. For identification, the weak dilution of morphine is coloured green and the stronger morphine is red.

Hospice Africa is based in Kampala, Uganda, and provides relief of pain and symptoms through a team of specialist palliative care nurses and doctors. The aim is to reduce patients' symptoms so that they can spend this important time at the end of their lives living in the fullest way possible, free from overwhelming pain and the loss of dignity that accompanies the pain.

Providing care at home--the belief that “hospice” should be a philosophy of care rather than a place to die--is a fundamental principle of Hospice Africa. Hospice Africa believes that patients are best cared for by those closest to the …