Mountains beyond Mountains: the house of Paul Farmer

Today, I paid a visit to the house of Paul Farmer, co-founder of the organization Zamni Lasante (Partners in Health). The house is across the street from the Zamni Lasante complex and is a little oasis of green in the midst of... brown.

Today a group of fifteen first year med students from Buffalo, NY, stopped by to tour the Zamni Lasante complex after volunteering in a nearby health clinic for five days. I did my best to make the tour interesting, but I'm convinced that I learned more from them than they learned from me. One girl spent a year working at a children's home in South Africa where she learned that the greatest impediment to helping people was cultural differences. Several others chimed in and said that, out of the 800+ patients they had seen over the past five days, a majority of ailments could have been prevented with proper nutrition. Child after child entered their clinic with an arm resting on their swollen bellies, complaining of a "stomachache".

Haitian meals often consist of starches that are deep fried in cooking oil. Canola oil is a staple in the food here and contributes greatly to the nation-wide epidemic of hypertension and obesity. The situation is ironic and sad. Cooking oil and American-importanted starches (such as white rice and flour) are cheaper and more accessible than real food. Children who lack proper nutrition experience weak muscles, chronic fatigue, depression, and a greater susceptibility to illnesses and infection. The problem is complicated because what happens in poverty-stricken families is a hunger-bingeing cycle that follows the economic conditions in the household. When resources come in, people buy cheap, abundant calories in the form of oil and flour that fill them up and stave off hunger. This leads to rapid fat storage which is a biological effect after a period of lower calorie intake or hunger. The problems that occur as a result of malnutrition and obesity are the source of many frustrations here.

The title of the book Mountains beyond Mountains references an old Haitian proverb that means that, as we overcome obstacles, others will follow. Medical treatment could be compared to one mountain in Cange and nutrition, another.

"The poorest parts of the world are by and large the places in which one can best view the worst of medicine and not because doctors in these countries have different ideas about what constitutes modern medicine. It’s the system and its limitations that are to blame"
- Paul Farmer