StemCell Therapy

Dr. Royneld Bourdeau, Haitian Health Foundation medical director

It has become a trenchant criticism of many non-government organizations in the international aid sphere in recent decades: bloated administrative budgets and overhead costs mean that most aid money gets funneled into salaries and associated perks. Many NGOs working in the developing world have their U.S. headquarters close to the centers of power, in plush office spaces in New York or Washington.

Not so for the Haitian Health Foundation. A humble, wood-paneled office on the banks of the Yantic River in Norwich works just as well. As it has since the early 1980s, when the organization was founded by local orthodontist Jeremiah Lowney, the HHF does an immense amount of work across a broad spectrum of areas. The foundation serves a predominantly rural area of southwest Haiti known as the GrandAnse, centered around the headquarters in the city of Jrmie. The primary work of HHF is in immediate health care needs, which are sorely underfunded in Haiti.

The foundation operates a full-service outpatient clinic in Jrmie, as well as a maternal waiting room, and offers a treatment for a particular type of protein malnourishment called kwashiorkor, which is common in the developing world. Out in the mountains to Jrmies south, HHF employs a small army of health agents at community clinics across just over 100 villages.

While health care is the backbone of the work done by HHF, its mission spills into what one might call a holistic approach to health and health care. For the HHF, decent housing, adequate food and sanitation systems are part of health care, part of what keeps people out of medical facilities. Respiratory infections, asthma and poor mental health are just some of the ailments that can result from poor housing. In coordination with Rotary clubs around New England, the HHF has also been engaged in the distribution of animals since the 1980s: first pigs, then chickens, and now goats to families throughout the GrandAnse. Two eggs a week is enough to keep a child from falling into kwashiorkor, Lowney says.

Part of that holistic approach to medicine, perhaps, results from Dr. Lowneys background in orthodontics. Dentistry, Lowney explains, is more oriented toward preventative medicine than most other specialties. He says that most medicine, by and large, still isnt that preventative, you know? You go in when youre sick. With dentistry you are always encouraged to go twice a year for a dental exam, get your teeth cleaned, that kind of thing. The HHF used to operate out of Lowneys orthodontics practice, still located across Sherman Street from the current offices.

Few countries have as proud-while-tragic a history as Haiti. It was the first free black republic in the world, winning independence from France in 1804 after the worlds first successful slave revolt. Almost immediately, outside forces sought to cripple the young country. In 1825, with warships at the ready, King Charles X of France demanded Haiti pay a debt to the former slave owners from whom the people of Haiti had freed themselves. The debt France demanded was 10 times Haitis annual revenue. The Haitian state was indebted into the 1940s. The nearly 30-year dictatorship of father and son Francois and Jean-Claude Duvalier was characterized by the hoarding of money and political repression. A pair of military coups in 1991 and 2004 added to political instability, and the 2010 earthquake and 2016 hurricane have led to an outbreak of disease in the country. Hurricane Matthew in October 2016 devastated the GrandAnse, and the HHF was fortunate not to have lost any colleagues. Since then, the organization has distributed some 150 tons of food in the region.

Lowney made his first trip to Haiti in 1981, after being asked by Daniel Patrick Reilly, the bishop of Norwich, to heed the call of Pope John Paul II for those in rich countries to reach out to those in poor countries. After repeated trips to Haiti throughout the early 1980s, Lowney came into contact with the sisters from Mother Teresas Missionaries of Charity, who eventually asked him to relocate his work to the GrandAnse, where medical services were lacking. Lowney founded HHF in 1985 with his wife, Virginia, who is also still involved in coordinating the Save a Family program, in which donors can sponsor individual families for a variety of needs, from housing to animals to sanitation.

While Lowney is still intimately involved in the organization, his daughter Marilyn now serves as the executive director. The organization has some 200 employees in Haiti, the vast majority of them Haitian. HHFs country director, Nadesha Mijoba, explained the organizations governing philosophy in a Skype interview from Jrmie. Were not here to tell the community how they should run their affairs. Were not here to preach to them. Rather, we work with them, she says.

There are many ways to help the Haitian Health Foundation. Go to haitianhealthfoundation.org/donate to learn how.

If you have an organization with an event that youd like us to consider for the Community page, please send the details to mmurphy@connecticutmag.com.

If you have an organization with an event that youd like us to consider for the Community page, please send the details to mmurphy@connecticutmag.com.

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Norwich to Haiti - Connecticut Magazine

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