Mountains Beyond Mountains.

As I was typing up some stuff for a future blog post about an organization called Partners in Health, I realized that my entry about the book Mountains Beyond Mountains, which talks ALOT about PIH and Paul Farmer never actually made it onto this blog.  A lot of my older posts are on my pre-married BLOG, and I have yet to figure out how to convert all the posts over to my new blog!

So I figured I would repost it here for all to read in hopes of giving some background on the organization, Paul Farmer, and the book Mountains Beyond Mountains.

So this book...everyone should read it. I have read it before, and I am currently reading it for school for my Health, Healing and Culture class. I must say it is so very different reading it in the context of a class, and I am getting soo many different things out of it than I did before. But this book has inspired me and evoked in me soo many different emtions...emotions of joy, feelings of inadequacy, and feeling as though I am not doing enough to change the world, feeling as though I am not doing enough with what I have been given...and the list could go on!

So this is a post for a forum I did for school, but I though it would be good to put it on here...so here goes...

WHY IS IT SUCH A BIG DEAL??

I have soo much to say about Farmer and PIH ...Farmer inspires me, he ignites in me a passion to see the world and people through a different lens, he challenges my conventional way of thinking, but more importantly he has opened my eyes to what it means to love. Farmer is after true transformation...he longs for hearts to be awakened and lives to be changed. He has set his sights high and made incredible progress along the way!

In the 60 minutes video, Farmer stated, "Everybody should have access to medical care – it shouldn’t be such a big deal!!!" and after hearing that...I thought WHY IS IT SUCH A BIG DEAL?? Why is healthcare and medical care such a big deal...why do the prices for services and medicines vary depending on what country you live in and your health insurance? We are all human beings who were created in Christ's image and all people should have equal opportunities in regards to medical care regardless of where they were born ...

In the Kidder text, Farmer stated, "I feel ambivalent about selling my services in a world where some can’t buy them" (p. 24). Why don't more doctors think this way? Farmer believes healthcare is a human right, and he doesn’t feel right charging people for services when they can’t afford them and are truly struggling to survive. They are not only suffering from a disease or illness, but they are also suffering from malnutrition and lack of resources. Farmer and company recognize that in order for a person to experience complete healing it is essential to treat ALL of the person, not simply just the disease or the illness. The patients get not only medicine, but also food and other resources. A health worker said, “Giving people medicine for TB and not giving them food is like washing your hands and drying them in the dirt” (Kidder, 2004, p. 34).

Ten million people a year die from treatable diseases, such as TB and malaria, because they don’t have access to the necessary vaccines and medicines to treat the diseases. TEN MILLION people!!This is not just a statistic…these are lives, lives that have been lost unnecessarily. There is no excuse for this. Why is it that their patients with AIDS and TB get better care in the impoverished country of Haiti than they do in the wealthy United States?

I have soo many unanswered questions and reading this book just reminds me of all the questions and frustrations that have been welling up in me, just longing to pour out. I feel the system is soo unfair, so unjust, so cruel – sometimes I feel ill-equipped because I don’t have a specific skill, and all I can be is an advocate, sometimes I feel it truly isn’t enough. I even go so far as to think just for one second…Maybe I should have gone into the medical field? And then before I know it that second is over…and I am reminded of where the Lord has me RIGHT NOW, and right now I must be at peace with that.

We are all in the same boat…we all want to be change agents. We all want to be used by God in tremendous ways to make a tremendous impact. Paul Farmer and PIH have done just this…they HAVE made a lasting impact on the lives of countless individuals. According to the 60-minute video, there is a Haitian expression his patients use when he is away… we miss him they say like dry earth misses the rain!!Now if that doesn’t demonstrate the impact he has had, then I don’t know what does!