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HOW WE LIVE: stories of families living on the margins in Armenia (March 26-27th)

March 10, 2010 in Armenia, Events by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

“Are these photographs going to make a difference in our lives?” asked Haykush Karapetyan, 50, when I photographed her this past July in Armenia. I met fifteen families like Haykush’s while documenting, on behalf of the Tufenkian Foundation, families living in extreme poverty. I could have met hundreds of thousands more.

Today, devastating numbers of people living along society’s margins in Armenia regularly live off garbage dumps, children battle malnutrition, alcoholism and domestic violence are commonplace, and families sleep in barns and tin shacks. According to the World Bank, this is how at least one in four people in Armenia lives.

On March 26 and March 27, please join me, curator Narineh Mirzaeian, and the Tufenkian Foundation for HOW WE LIVE, a special exhibition and book release which tells the story of families living on the margins in Armenia.

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RMF Success: Accupunture in Uganda Helps one Orphan Sleep Soundly

March 10, 2010 in Uganda by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

Update 2010

From RMF Team Uganda:

Aketch Tereza, a 16year old girl in senior four at Mama Kevina Comprehensive  School in Agururu Tororo, is one of the students traumatized by war and HIV/AIDS.

She is an orphan losing her father in war and losing her mother to HIV/AIDS.  She was raised by her grandparents enduring the hardship of the rural poor. School fees and daily meals were very difficult to attain.

Afflicted with nightmares of falling in a ditch and being chased by someone with ill intent Tereza took advantage of acupuncture treatments being offered at Mama Kevina.  Treatments reduced the stress of being an orphan and her nightmares disappeared

She also uses the treatment to help her concentrate during reading, previously when  she went for her private reading/revision, only bad memories would arise and her stress would increase.

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RMF LA Marathon Cheer Station–Mile 23 (Santa Monica)

March 10, 2010 in Athletes for Real Medicine, Events, Haiti by Allison Glennon | No comments

Dear Friends,

Help us build and man our LA Marathon Cheer Station!

As an Official Charity, Real Medicine is given the opportunity to decorate nearly 1/2 mile of the course in any way we would like. In support of the people in Haiti, we have decided to make our cheer station a statement of hope for Haiti. We are collecting solid color sheets and decorating them with messages of support and healing from the LA Community. Then, on race day we are going to hang them as a kind of tent city as a reminder that that there is still so much to be done for the people of Haiti, and also that there are still so many people here in the community who want to get involved and show their support.

Here is how you can help:

1) Collect and decorate sheets with classmates or friends

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Video: Rubble in 360 Degrees by Immersive Media

March 8, 2010 in Haiti by Allison Glennon | No comments

Take a drive around Port-au-Prince…

Immersive Media developed a camera with roughly 15 lenses all shooting at the same time and the technology to allow the viewer to choose the vantage point while wacthing the video play back. Basically, you can “take a look around the frame” in a full 360 degrees. In this video someone stuck the camera to the roof of a car and drove around Port-au-Prince. Take a look… Video

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With Haitian Schools in Ruins, Children in Limbo (NYTimes.com)

March 8, 2010 in Haiti by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

After Haiti’s quake: children in Pétionville danced at a day care program run by the French Red Cross. More Photos »

By SIMON ROMERO

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“…but long-term care isn’t even on the horizon.” –Associated Press

March 5, 2010 in Haiti by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

“…but long-term care isn’t even on the horizon.” –Associated Press

Maybe, but we just signed on to pay long-term, living wages for local medical staff in Port-au-Prince. There is still a lot to do–people are sleeping under sheets in the rain, there is still no food or clean water–but there are still groups trying …to help Haiti get back home again. Find out more: www.realmedicinefoundation.org

Billions for Haiti, a criticism for every dollar (AP)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — The world’s bill for the Haitian earthquake is large and growing — now $2.2 billion — and so is the criticism about how the money is being spent.

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Unexpected Side-effect: Empowerment (RMF India Update)

March 2, 2010 in India by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

RMF India
by Michael Matheke

Over the past few weeks the RMF team has been very busy, and our program has made some impressive steps forward. In addition to high-level meetings in Delhi to continue and strengthen our relationships with high-ranking government officials in both Delhi and Bhopal, the on the ground realities and details of the program are moving forward nicely. Specifically, we have completed the following major programmatic goals:

1)    Staff, including district coordinators, has been hired and

finalized in four of the five districts the “Malnutrition Eradication”

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UPDATE: Haiti Relief efforts — March 1st, 2010

March 1, 2010 in Haiti by Real Medicine Foundation Staff | No comments

Haiti Relief efforts
March 1, 2010
By Jonathan White

➢    Number one issue is provision of adequate shelter/housing.
➢    Food assistance moving into second surge phase with food baskets.
➢    Decongestion of settlement camps and creation of adequate sanitation is top priority.
➢    Rubble/Debris removal begins with over 86,000 Haitian workers hired.

The latest OCHA situation report from the UN reports that while the immediate emergency needs (food, water, health care) in Port-au-Prince are being covered, organizations continue to deal with many requests from outlying areas.

While the Port-au-Prince and directly surrounding area suffered the highest levels of destruction, the other provinces of Haiti have seen an inflow of over 400,000 people from the capital.  This has put a tremendous strain on already struggling communities and the humanitarian assistance provided must be balanced between these two areas.   Updated figures in this report include the latest estimate that 222,517 died and over 1.2 million are in need of shelter.

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Looking for lessons in Haiti’s epic tragedy

March 1, 2010 in General by Allison Glennon | No comments

By CHARLES J. HANLEY (AP) – 12 hours ago

Tons of rice and beans tell how the world is helping Haiti. Missing tents, tarps and toilets show how it is falling short.

Amid the misery, experts already are looking for lessons from the Haiti catastrophe — in time, they hope, for the next nightmare. Some voices call for an international humanitarian force to take charge in future emergencies.

Haiti’s Jan. 12 earthquake has tested man’s humanity to man more than any natural calamity in modern memory, challenging the ability of the community of nations and its global emergency network to meet an unprecedented volume of demands for food, water, medical help and shelter.

“This is a major test for all of us and we cannot afford to fail,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator John Holmes told aid groups after his latest visit to the crippled Caribbean nation.

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Haiti’s Futile Race Against the Rain

March 1, 2010 in General by Allison Glennon | No comments

From NYTimes.com

By LAWRENCE DOWNES
Published: February 28, 2010

There were floods on Saturday in Les Cayes, in southwestern Haiti. It rained in Port-au-Prince on Thursday, and again on Saturday and Sunday night, long enough to slick the streets and make a slurry of the dirt and concrete dust. Long enough, too, to give a sense of what will happen across the country in a few weeks, when the real storms start.

Mud will wash down the mountains, and rain will overflow gutters choked with rubble and waste, turning streets into filthy rivers. Life will get even more difficult for more than a million people.

New misery and sickness will drench the displaced survivors of the Jan. 12 earthquake — like the 16,000 or so whose tents and flimsy shacks fill every available inch of the Champ de Mars, the plaza in Port-au-Prince by the cracked and crumbled National Palace, or the 70,000 who have made a city of the Petionville Club, a nine-hole golf course on a mountainside above the capital.

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