A more serendipitous encounter than the one that occurred last month in the middle of Guyana in Mahdia, the administrative centre of the Potaro-Siparuni Region, is unlikely to have happened anywhere else in the western hemisphere.
There and then, Dr Edelu Hernandez Soto − the resident doctor from the Cuban Medical Brigade − expressed his appreciation for the work of the US Military Tropical Medical Course to Lieutenant Commander David Brett-Major − an Internal-Infections Disease Physician − a participant in the Medical Readiness Training Exercises sponsored by the United States Army Southern Command, possibly Cuba’s most proximate strategic adversary.
That exercise, targeting the Bartica and Mahdia townships, was conducted by a 12-member United States military team that included dermatologists, internal-infectious disease physicians, paediatricians and general medical practitioners. Its twin mission was to train US physicians outside of US borders and also to provide a service to Guyanese citizens. The US Military Tropical Medicine Course has been ongoing in Guyana for the past six years.
That exercise was only one component of the US Southern Command series of humanitarian assistance programmes to Guyana. Others have included the construction of a disaster-relief warehouse, emergency operation centre, shelters, wells, and schools and the provision of dental, medical and surgical services in Guyana over the past 15 years.
New Horizons exercises usually take place in rural, underprivileged areas, but on one previous occasion, military teams constructed several buildings, including the unlovely St Mary’s school opposite the imposing Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in the centre of the city. This year, several Southern Command military humanitarian exercises have been taking place simultaneously since July when nearly 650 American soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen started arriving.
A health centre was built in La Penitence and a school in Bel Air by the 878th Engineering Battalion of the Georgia National Guard Reserve in conjunction with the Guyana Defence Force. The Timehri Nursery school, constructed during a previous New Horizons mission, was also rehabilitated. The US Air Force medical team in collaboration with the Defence Force and the Ministry of Health embarked on a public, health-care programme. Operation Southern Partner − a military-to-military exchange programme − began in May and Operation Continuing Promise − a medical mission aboard the USNS Comfort medical ship − also visited Georgetown. It was estimated that over 12,000 people would have benefited from medical clinics at Linden, Timehri, Diamond, Skeldon and elsewhere this year.
It was reassuring that President Bharrat Jagdeo made an appearance and delivered complimentary comments at the commissioning of the East La Penitence Health Centre last week. The President had also visited the United States naval vessel USNS Kearsarge last year November when it came on a two-week humanitarian mission. Addressing crew members at that time, he said that Guyana was “extremely grateful” for the assistance that was given to its people.
Gratitude is good but emulation is better. Guyana must try to reduce its high dependency on foreign assistance and build its own competence and spirit of self-reliance. The Guyana Defence Board which the President chairs can learn many important military lessons from the US Southern Command. For example, the main participants in the exercises were not regular soldiers but reservists and members of the National Guard who were rotated between Guyana and America over the past three months. With vision, the same could be done for local military reservists − in what used to be the Guyana People’s Militia − who could be mobilised to work with, and learn from, the Americans.
In the final analysis, what does it say for our national independence and our national health system that so many hinterland residents swarm American and Cuban doctors for basic health care while four medical doctors are comfortably ensconced in the cabinet in the city?
