People-to-People Health Project Meeting Basic Needs in Iraq, but Security is Key

Baltimore, September 17, 2003 — One big key to Iraq's future is how well its humanitarian needs are met, according to Steve Weaver, coordinator for the multi-agency All Our Children campaign for Iraqi children's health.

"Addressing the sensitive political and religious issues will be very difficult if humanitarian needs aren't being met," he said. While the United States government has major responsibilities for Iraq's future, he noted, a people-to-people initiative like All Our Children has a unique role to play.

Iraqis, including those who bristle at anyone connected to the U.S. military intervention, express deep appreciation for independent efforts such as All Our Children, according to Weaver who is based in Baghdad.

All Our Children is one of the few humanitarian programs operating in Iraq with only private funding, he said. Stateside supporters, the initiative's partner agencies and the Iraqi beneficiaries value this aspect of All Our Children.

"I wish the children in my community could see you and other Americans like you," Ibrahim, a community leader in suburban Baghdad, told Weaver recently. "Americans are soldiers for them. They need to see other Americans."

"We were concerned that putting 'From people in North America' [on personal hygiene kits] could cause some resistance," Weaver said. "I asked a number of Iraqis about this. All said it was not a problem. As one man put it, 'We have no problem with the American people.'"

A woman in Baghdad's Huriya neighborhood wept as All Our Children distributed such hygiene kits in her community. "May God bless you for this," she said. When she learned that ordinary Americans had assembled the kits, she replied, "May God bless them!"

All Our Children began in December 2002 as a new initiative to help Iraqi civilians already battered by wars, a repressive regime and a decade of trade sanctions. LWR joined long-standing partners Church World Service, Mennonite Central Committee and five other groups in the humanitarian venture.

Under the current, unstable conditions in Iraq, several All Our Children projects are proceeding, two are on hold and one has been expanded. After the car bomb attack on U.N. headquarters in August, All Our Children boosted fresh food deliveries to children's institutions to fill a gap in support. Other current work includes purchasing beds to relieve crowding at two pediatric hospitals in northern Iraq, providing medical and hygiene items, wheelchairs, bedding and fresh food for various Baghdad-area hospitals, clinics, centers for street kids, a church-run orphanage and a public home for the elderly.

From December 2002 through September 4, 2003, All Our Children has raised $606,748 toward a goal of $1 million, plus in-kind donations of medical supplies, personal hygiene kits and canned meat valued at $183,360.

On hold pending improved security, Weaver noted, is a program to help lessen the impact of conflict and conflict-related trauma on Iraqi children.

Although insecurity is causing humanitarian aid groups to keep a very low profile, it is Iraq's citizens who are bearing the greatest burdens not only of fear but also of scarcities in the food supply, electricity and clean water, Weaver said.