Open Eyes, Open Minds

On Tuesday, our AltBreak group had the opportunity to meet Dr. Paul Farmer; after shaking his hand at a pre-reception we listened to him speak about Global Health Equity, Haiti post-earthquake, and AIDs treatments around the world. All of us were nervous and excited to meet this public health superstar, the poster child for dedication, commitment, and the war on infectious disease. But I have a confession:

3 months ago, I had no idea who Paul Farmer was.

Over winter break I started reading a couple books to enlighten myself on Haiti and this was the first time I had heard about Paul Farmer. Like I mentioned in my previous blog post, one of the books I read was by Paul Farmer and the other was about Paul Farmer. From reading about him (and Haiti) I have learned an immense amount about the history of disease, politics, and disaster within Haiti. I've learned about Paul Farmers life and his work in Haiti and around the world. I've learned about the WHO and U.N. and their influences in global health issues as well as their role Haiti's earthquake relief effort. After reading about all of this, I was SO excited to hear Paul Farmer himself speak. I think he is an amazing example of a human being and an incredibly intelligent and driven man. Paul Farmer is the kind of person that makes me feel like there is true good in the world-- he stresses the necessity of a local voice in public policy (ie. Haitian people explaining what they need and want in their country politically, economically, etc.) He works to correct the "chronic" AND "acute" issues that we see so deeply rooted in our society and impoverished societies like Haiti.

If you can't tell, now I love Paul Farmer and keep him as inspiration in the back of my head. But I felt a little awkward that other members of the group had known and respected Paul Farmer for so much longer than I had. I felt uninformed and ignorant for not knowing that such issues existed and that such a great man and his entourage were doing great work to combat these problems. I recognize that there are many large issues ravaging all types of societies in every corner of the world. I also realize that I am young and can't know about everything that's going on in the world. But I feel so much more aware now that I have learned so much about Haiti, the WHO & U.N., large global health issues, foreign aid policies, and all the interconnected issues that these things affect.

This meta-reflection leads me to a conclusion that reconfirms one of my fundamental beliefs: knowledge is the answer. In order to help people, to make the world a better place, or at least to avoid causing accidental pain or suffering, it is important to learn, to educate ourselves. We will never be done learning but the more we learn, the better work we can do. As we saw in our last chapter of "The Big Truck That Went By" the foreign aid that came in after the earthquake in Haiti actually caused a great deal of damage and has still not created a significant amount of good. I feel like my eyes have been opened to these whole new part of the world, and this whole new set of interconnected issues. I feel like this knowledge helps me to exercise and open my mind. Ultimately, open minds are able to see a wide variety of solutions, consider multiple outcomes, and apply previous knowledge to avoid re-creating devastating issues in order to achieve will progress and development within the world.