The Past Life

The Inside Scoop
The Past Life

By: Cam Alyssa Wilson 

In the mist of rebellious activity in the Parisian countryside a young group of doctors made the historic decision to go help those wounded by war and natural disasters; unknowingly changing what the idea of humanitarian efforts was defined as. Unlike most doctors and nurses of the time, these doctors didn't care what side, what race, or what country you were from. If you needed medical help they were there to help. Soon after the issue in Persia, more horrifying images were sent across the airways, of Biafra and the people suffering there in.

Max Recamier and Pascal Greletty-Bosviel were the only two volunteer doctors with The International Committee of the Red Cross. Unknown to most people, The Red Cross is not a medical organization at all. The Red Cross recruited these two men because they had worked with the ICRC in the past. Their task was to find other volunteer doctors willing to go on a humanitarian mission to Biafra. Going from nice clean environment to a hospital whose highest priority was making sure patients and doctors survived the frequent attacks from Nigerian armed forces was a wake up call for these doctors. After that they began to lay the foundations for a new form of humanitarianism that would ignore political or religious boundaries and only pay attention to those suffering.

In 1971, Raymond Borel and Philippe Bernier, journalists from the medical review Tonus, issued an appeal to establish a band of doctors to help people suffering in the midst and wake of major disasters"

                 

     

On December 22, 1971 Médecins Sans Frontières.’(Doctors without borders) was officially created. MSF’s first mission, in 1972, was to Managua, Nicaragua where an earthquake killed upwards of 25,000 people. At that time a volunteer base of 300 doctors, nurses, and support staff, including the entire group of founding doctors collectively banded together on a relief mission. In 1974, Hurricane Fifi devastated Honduras MSF moved mountains to help the people survive. In 1975, MSF established its first mega-scale medical program during the refugee crisis, providing medical care for Cambodians seeking refugee from Pol Pot’s rule. Sense then Doctors Without Borders has set up 28 different countries with 30,000 hands reaching throughout the world at any one time

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"It’s simple really: go where the patients are. It seems obvious, but at the time it was a revolutionary concept because borders got in the way. It’s no coincidence that we called it ‘Médecins Sans Frontières.’"

-BERNARD KOUCHNERMSF FOUNDER

Come back in a week for the next Inside Scoop!

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/about-us/history-principles/founding-msf