Posts Tagged ‘Medicine’
Human Rights is Not Just Charity in Haiti
Human Rights in Haiti
By Monika Kalra Varma — she is the Acting Director of the RFK Memorial Center for Human Rights and has worked extensively on advocacy and legal actions related to the United Nations, the Organization of American States and other donor states’ obligations to human rights within Haiti.
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumy/2006/12/human-rights-is-not-just-charity-in.php
Human Rights Day is not only a day to commemorate the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but a day to look towards what challenges lie ahead for realizing human rights in even the world’s most difficult of situations. There is perhaps no greater challenge in the Western Hemisphere than Haiti, nor a greater opportunity.
Haiti as a country has a tremendous commitment to human rights, one that we in the United States have a difficult time even recognizing. This includes the right to health, “the right of every citizen to decent housing, education, food and social security.” Haiti, the most impoverished nation in our hemisphere, accepts these greater responsibilities despite not yet having the resources to fulfill its obligations.
So what does a government that takes on such responsibilities do when it has no resources? It reaches out to its friends in the international community to help it grow and provide for its people. In 2004, countries around the world did just that – they pledged just over $1 billion to Haiti through the Interim Cooperation Framework, a plan to help the Haitian state develop the sustainable institutions and infrastructure necessary to provide access to health care, education and other human rights. The framework called for funds to be used in a way that empowers the government with the capacity to do its job better over time.
Donors met again last week to check on their progress. The Haitian government was commended for “sound fiscal policies” by international leaders including the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs.
Bablefish for Medics
Wanted to share this project with anyone who practices medicine in the field. It’s a great resources.
Hesperian, a publisher in Oakland, CA collaborated with Medical Education Cooperation with Cuba (MEDICC) to produce an English edition of their Health For All Medical Glossary, originally published by MEDICC Review in Spanish, French and Creole. Developed for the Haitian graduates of Cuba’s Latin American Medical School in Cuba; the glossary assists these committed young doctors on their return to Haiti–since they learned medicine in Spanish, speak with their patients in Creole, and compose clinical records in French.
Crazy.
Download the glossary as a PDF organized alphabetically by:
I have copies of each on my thumb drive so I can access it on a laptop of hand held when I’m in the field. I’m seriously thinking about making a derivative work out of it for BOTG volunteers in the form of a printed field manual. Will let everyone know if I do that. Would take me a few weeks to lay it out, but I think it’s a worthy project.
Man-Made Disasters Cripple Haitian Care
I read a great article by Kevin Edmonds called “The Undermining of Haitian Health Care: Setting the Stage for Disaster” that really made me think. He rightly pointed out, and I totally noticed while I provided emergency and primary medical care to the Haitians, is there is a serious lack of medically trained locals to care for their own people.
I’m not saying there aren’t any, but of those who are qualified, and I use that term rather loosely, they are mostly trained elsewhere. I actually rode into Haiti from the Dominican Republic with a Haitian medical student, who is in this final year at a school in Santo Domingo. I’m not sure if he’s even planing on returning to Haiti, as his wife and family live in New York. One of the doctors I worked with once I got into country, also trained in the DR, is currently in Miami working on passing the USMLE. He may not return either. After all, what’s the point?
There are medical schools in Haiti, but they are almost as scarce as clean water, and few Haitians can afford to attend them anyway. The medical school at the University of Tabarre in Port-au-Prince was the first ever to provide free tuition to students, which is a huge thing. While it withstood the earthquake on January 12, it’s not withstood the many man-made disasters that have occurred in its very short history.
