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Doctors Without Borders Week at MIT and Harvard will be held from October 29th until November 4th, 2007. There will be talks given by doctors who have worked for Doctors Without Borders, screenings of the film Invisibles, and a photography exhibit open to the MIT and Harvard communities.

Opportunities for making contributions to Doctors Without Borders will be available throughout the event and through this website.

We hope you’ll join us in celebrating the amazing organization that brings aid and medicine to some of the most remote places on Earth, and we hope that this week will also inspire you to help make a difference in your own way. Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres) is an internationally-based, non-governmental medical organization with a presence in over 70 countries throughout the world. The volunteers working for MSF include doctors, nurses, engineers, water and sanitation experts, administrators, as well as other professionals. These volunteers lend their expertise, talent, time, and energy to the organization, which in turn allows MSF to alleviate some of the worst humanitarian crises occurring throughout the world.

The mission of Doctors Without Borders is to provide medical services to those who may not otherwise afford or have access to them. Doctors Without Borders volunteers can be found in some of the most dangerous or remote areas throughout the world. These areas and the people living there are very often affected by disasters, epidemics, armed conflict, or deep levels of poverty. The independent character of the organization allows MSF to provide medical service based on an assessment of need and not based on political, economic, or religious categorization.

In addition to actually providing medical services, responding to epidemics, running long-term health programs, and provide water, sanitation, and shelter materials, Doctors Without Borders volunteers also bear witness to the humanitarian conditions that they observe in the field. They become the voice for those millions of displaced persons (due to natural and man-made disasters), malnourished children, and marginalized groups. The work that these volunteers do is not only significant on its own merits, but also in its consequence: exposing to the rest of the international community conditions that are often hidden or too remote to be seen. An organization such as Doctors Without Borders merits credit from and the support of the international community because of the work that its volunteers do every day of the year.

The work that Doctors Without Borders does encompasses several broad areas:

1. Health care provision
2. Medical centers and facilities (rehabilitation and operation)
3. Surgery
4. Epidemic response (Epidemiology response: diagnose, monitor, contain, treat)
5. Vaccination campaigns
6. Feeding centers for malnourished children
7. Mental heath care
8. Water and sanitation provision
9. Shelter materials

Long-term programs include -Campaign against malnutrition
-Treatment of infectious diseases (TB, sleeping sickness, HIV/AIDS)
-Medical and psychological care to marginalized groups (street children, etc)

There are many ways that we can help make a difference. The field team of doctors, nurses, engineers, and numerous other volunteers working for Doctors Without Borders are dedicating a large part of their lives to helping people all over the world. We can support them by making a donation, or even volunteering to be part of the field team.

Contributions collected as part of Doctors Without Borders @ MIT and Harvard will be tax-deductible. For more information, please email us at msf07[at]mit[dot]edu.

If you would like to make a donation in tribute to someone, please contact msf07[at]mit[dot]edu with your name, your donation amount, the name of the person for whom you are making the donation, and, if you’d like, your tribute. We will feature them on this website, and they will remain here until the end of the academic year.

What does your donation mean? Here is a small list of the things that Doctors Without Borders can accomplish with your support.

MSF was founded in 1971 as the first nongovernmental organization to both provide emergency medical assistance and bear witness publicly to the plight of the people it assists.
– http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org

The Doctors Without Borders Week planning team is made up of students from MIT and Harvard. If you’re interested in helping out the week before the event, please email msf07[at]mit[dot]edu.