Dear MDRT Foundation Grants Committee:

John Lee (34-year MDRT member John Marshall Lee, CLU, RHU, of Fairfield, Connecticut), representing the Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT) Foundation, presented the Haitian Health Foundation with a $15,000 grant on Thursday, November 21, 2002. Thank you! I have submitted the presentation photo and story to several local newspapers to publicize the generosity of the MDRT Foundation.

John Marshall Lee, CLU, RHU (left), on behalf of the MDRT Foundation presents Jeremiah J. Lowney Jr., DDS, MPH, president of the Haitian Health Foundation, with a $15,000 grant check.

John and (his wife) Mary Lou have walked among the poor of Jeremie (Haiti) and have shared their personal charity generously with these poorest neighbors in our hemisphere. They know the need and how the Haitian Health Foundation brings improved health and the gift of hope to over 200,000 of the area’s poorest.

Your grant will help to improve health delivery at Castillon, a very remote satellite clinic, which serves as a hub clinic for 15 very inaccessible villages. Solar energy will allow refrigerators for medicines and vaccines, an extended work day, an overnight site for health workers and visiting volunteers, and a place for young people to study in the late evenings.

Children at the feeding pavilion, which was built by the Haitian Health Foundation in Jeremie, Haiti.

The maternal mortality in this area is scandalous! More than 1,000 women die for every 100,000 live births. In the United States, the statistic is four per 100,000. A portion of the grant will provide training for nurse midwives who will travel to Castillon and other villages to upgrade the skills of the traditional midwife. This will certainly improve the terrible statistics. It took great effort to dissuade the traditional midwives from using animal dung on the newborn umbilicus. Dung is a terrific hemostat (used to stop bleeding), but causes tetanus in the child. This is one example of cultural remedies that must be changed by trained Haitians.

Please extend my sincere gratitude to the MDRT Foundation Trustees for their generosity in reaching out a loving hand of caring and compassion to these needy people trapped in poverty.

Sincerely,
Jeremiah J. Lowney Jr., DDS, MS, MPH
President
Haitian Health Foundation