Our family’s visit to a refugee camp with Doctors Without Borders.
October 26, 2008
Dr. Marc Levin is a volunteer doctor who travels to war- torn countries to give medical aid to refugees.
Today we had the distinct pleasure of taking our children to a mock Refugee Camp in Griffith Park, Ca. Dr. Marc Levin is a doctor that volunteers with Doctor Without Borders that go to these war torn places like Chad and Niger to provide aid and medical support. He took us to make shift tents where they provide shelter, or water, vaccinations or medical treatment for Choloria or malnutrition. He explained how people will wait two hours for water and start with 5 liters per day. (The average household consumes about 100 liters a day). If the refugees venture out of the camp, they take a risk of being beaten up, kidnapped, or worse killed. Here are some photo’s from the tour.
The tour lasted about 40 minutes and it was worth every minute. Go this site here: http://www.msf.ca/blogs/RefugeeCamp.php to learn more. They will be going to Santa Monica Peir next on their tour. San Diego will be after Santa Monica.
Dr. Levin shows us a tin car that a refugee made. Behind him is a make shift shelter that one would make if you do not have a tent.
My 4 year old Kylie got to see what a tent looks like that a family, up to 10-13 people would live in. She said we were "lucky to have a house."
A standard refugee tent.
Our kids tried to lift the liters of water that are handed out. Women and girls are normally the ones that have to carry these heavy buckets of water back to camp.
Dr. Levin explains how babies are weighed and measured to see how malnourised they are. They are given peanut butter, sugar, and milk, called "Plumpy Nut" to help them gain weight quickly.
I loved to see that my kids and other children were able to see first hand what refugees go through.
Dr. Levin gave first hand experiences and how 35 year old Doctors without Borders aid refugees and IDP's live.
This was the vaccination tent. The ice boxes would come from France with the Measle vaccine, and then transferred to ice coolers where the nurses and trained volunteers would go to city to city and school to school to help wipe out Measles.
These cubes of wheat and sugar are given to the refugees as they enter the camp.
The saddest thing I saw were the pictures from children showing armed men coming into their home and city and killing people, including their family and dogs.
It was a pleaure to be guided on this tour by Dr. Levin, a doctor from Doctors without Borders. I became even more aware of the magnitude of their mission. Dr. Levin said, "he will never be the same" and it had "changed the way he saw his future."
Blogger: Bobbi Miller-Moro
Courtesy of: Angela dreams
Bobbi at Moro Films.com
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