The
IRAQI Childrens Project: 15 Years Later
From 1991-1994, Medicine
For Peace’s Iraqi Children’s Project brought more than twenty Iraqi
children suffering from congenital heart disease to the United States
for life-saving surgery. MFP was assisted in the project by the
Fellowship of Reconciliation, of Nyack, NY, the Quaker Meetings
in Philadelphia and Bethesda, MD and by a host of personal donors
committed to relieving the suffering of Iraqi children during the
period of the UN imposed sanctions. Ill Iraqi Children came to New
York, Philadelphia, New Jersey, and Washington, DC and were looked
after by host families before surgery and during their convalescence.
Communication with the families of the Iraqi children was impossible
during the Saddam Hussein era in Iraq. Following the 2003 US-led
invasion of Iraq, Medicine For Peace has attempted to locate the
children who came to the US for surgery and determine if they remain
in good health.
We are happy to report
that most of the children we took to the US for surgery are in excellent
health but are under enormous stress from the lack of security and
hardships imposed on them by the five-year-long war. Other news
we received from our colleagues in Iraq concerning the Iraqi children
has been troubling. Donya, a young girl from Hilla, south of Baghdad,
succumbed to congestive heart failure. She was unable to have a
curative procedure while in the US and the lack of intensive medical
care in Iraq hastened her death. We were saddened by the news that
Bishar, a Kurdish boy from then north of Iraq, has also died. Evidently
he was a victim of the violence but no further details were available.
Bishar‘s dad was a doctor and poet. He published a Kurdish newspaper
entitled, Courage”, and translated T.S. Eliot’s poetry into Kurdish.
Bishar was a gentle and caring boy much like his father.
Many of the children
and their families were unable to be found, no doubt due to the
massive displacement of the Iraqi population since 2003. According
to UN sources, 2.5 million Iraqis are internally displaced to other
parts of Iraq. The displaced Iraqis are not living with friends
or relatives but are often in crowded insecure situations unable
to return to their homes because of military attacks or sectarian
violence. There are an additional two million Iraqi refugees abroad
(1.5 million in Syria, and more than 500,000 in Jordan). Most of
the children we took to the US for surgery were from poor families
and it is unlikely that they had the resources to leave the country.
Long-term colleagues
of Medicine For Peace in Iraq continue to search for the missing
children.
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