Spotlight On: Yemage Medical Center in Harar, Ethiopia

By Drew Schuler

The Yemage Medical Center in Harar, Ethiopia built with many donations and much community support.

The story of Yemage Medical Center began as the story of one man.

Sebri Omer is a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born and raised in Harar, Ethiopia, before fleeing his country's civil strife as a teenager in 1977. After a few years in a camp in the neighboring East African nation of Djibouti, he was granted refugee status in the United States in 1980.

In 1997, when Sebri returned to visit his family and homeland after 20 years, he was a successful small business owner and self-made man who lived in metro-Atlanta with his wife and four children. Visiting a cousin in Harar's antiquated public hospital changed his life and began this story.

Sebri discovered hospital patients jammed twenty or more to a room. The conditions were abysmal, the need was enormous, and Sebri, a man with no medical background, vowed to make a difference by building a modern medical facility.

Sebri returned home to Buford, Georgia, and started talking to medical professionals and hospital administrators and fellow immigrants about his vision. Defying all personal doubts about his plan, he sold one of his two convenience stores to raise enough capital to leverage local bank financing. In 2001, the Yemage Medical Center opened as Harar's first modern hospital. Although Yemage, meaning hope in Harari, has been welcomed and embraced by the community, financial resources have always been a challenge.

A hospital room at Yemage furnished with donations of surplus supplies and equipment.

A few years ago, Sebri connected with MedShare. As in so many other instances, MedShare has been able to serve as the link between unmet need and excess supply. MedShare's first two 40-foot containers of medical supplies and equipment nearly doubled the hospital's capacity.

In July 2007, MedShare sent a fifth container to Yemage Medical Center and now Sebri is looking towards the construction of a hospice wing for AIDS patients and their families.

Yemage Medical Center began ten years ago as Sebri's story. And -- with your help and support -- it is also one of MedShare's many stories of making a difference in people's lives around the world.

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Saturday, October 27, 2007
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