Six Months after the Earthquake: Time to Build Public Health Care in Haiti

	A young patient is seen by a Haitian member of the Henry Reeve Emergency Medical Contingent in Port-au-Prince.

July 29, 2010--In the six months since the deadly earthquake struck Haiti, MEDICC and its partners have launched multiple initiatives to support long-term health care provided by hundreds of doctors on the frontlines in clinics and hospitals across the country. These are young graduates from Haiti and the region trained at Havana’s Latin American Medical School, joining over 350 Cuban doctors and other health professionals to dramatically increase access to health care for all Haitians by building a system of public health services. To date, MEDICC has:

• Matched a generous grant from The Christopher Reynolds Foundation with hundreds of individual online donations, to raise funds for the young doctors in Haiti through a joint project with Global Links and the Pan American Health Organization. MEDICC presented its first installment of $50,000 to Global Links, a Pittsburgh-based nonprofit that has worked with Haiti’s public health system for over 20 years. Through PAHO, 40-foot shipping containers of essential medicines, surgical instruments, equipment and supplies are guaranteed to reach the network of 400+ Cuban-trained Haitian and Latin American physicians.
• Published a four-language medical glossary--English, Creole, French and Spanish--containing 4,000 commonly used medical terms, to improve communication between international medical teams and patients. In cooperation with The Hesperian Foundation, the English translation was added to the online edition of the Health for All Medical Glossary now available for free from both organizations’ websites and as a searchable wiki:  www.medicc.org and http://creole.hesperian.net/ Hundreds of Cuban-trained doctors in Haiti were also supplied with the print edition.
• Reported on-the-ground relief efforts in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, including personal interviews with Haitian doctors, international medical teams, and patients.  The extraordinary stories and photos are documented in the blog Field Notes from MEDICC at http://mediccglobal.wordpress.com/ and also in the pages of MEDICC Review at www.medicc.org/mediccreview.
• Co-sponsored an international conference in Washington, DC, with the Center for International Policy on “Cuban Public Health Cooperation in Haiti” to help educate policymakers and the public on multilateral reconstruction efforts. Three MEDICC board members and senior staff presented at the all-day briefing. http://ciponline.org/CIP_Publications/May2010ConfReportCuba.pdf

	Waris, age 8, completed a 30-mile, six-hour bike ride in England to raise money for Haitiian doctors!

South-South Medical Cooperation

While other emergency medical teams have transitioned out of the country, the Cuban-trained doctors from Haiti and 26 other countries continue to serve within the Cuban-led medical contingent, the largest in Haiti. As of May 2, the following services have been provided:

341,241 patient consultations
8,715 surgeries (3,849 major and 4,866 minor)
1,617 attended births
111,250 persons vaccinated
72,773 patients received rehabilitation services
121,405 children and youth received psychological services

	Dr. Peter Bourne, Chair, MEDICC Board of Directors , presents Kathleen Hower, Executive Director of Global Links, with $50,000 for Haiti medical relief and reconstruction efforts.

Addressing long-term sustainable health care, a trilateral agreement between Haiti, Cuba and Brazil will provide for 10 new hospitals and training for medical personnel for the Haitian public health system; while Venezuela has pledged construction of 30 health centers, 30 community hospitals, 30 physical therapy units, a prosthetics factory and three medical equipment repair workshops.

Donate now online at www.medicc.org or mail your check to MEDICC, P.O. Box 361449, Decatur, GA 30036.