Project HOPE Delivers over $17 Million of Medicines to Kyrgyzstan to Help Patients with Diabetes and Cardiovascular Diseases
Project HOPE has delivered over $17 million of donated medicine to the capital city of Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan. The donated medications will aid tens of thousands of patients suffering from diabetes and cardiovascular diseases throughout Kyrgyzstan, where there has been a shortage of medicine.
Millwood, VA, February 5, 2013
Project HOPE, a global health education and humanitarian assistance organization, has delivered over $17 million of donated medicine to the capital city of Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan. The donated medications will aid tens of thousands of patients suffering from diabetes and cardiovascular diseases throughout Kyrgyzstan, where there has been a shortage of medicine.
Project HOPE’s corporate partners Bristol-Myers Squibb and Teva Pharmaceuticals donated the medicines, and the United States Department of State funded the transportation of the humanitarian airlift. The medicines will be distributed by Project HOPE and Kyrgyzstan’s Ministry of Public Health to six hospitals and five family medicine centers in Bishkek and surrounding regions.
According to the Republican Medical Information Center, a primary source of health data in Kyrgyzstan, cardiovascular disease is the main cause of death for adults in Kyrgyzstan, and close to 5% of the overall population has diabetes. Eighteen thousand people – primarily men of working age – die annually from heart disease in this nation of five million.
“Heart disease and diabetes are vast and intractable problems in Kyrgyzstan,” said Colin Credle, Project HOPE’s Regional Manager for Humanitarian Aid in Central Asia. “The current government has insufficient funds to purchase necessary medicines, and the country itself is remote, making any deliveries of medicines challenging. The pharmaceuticals donated by Project HOPE and its corporate partners will be tremendously impactful in addressing the most dire medical needs of Kyrgyzstan”
An official handover ceremony in the capital is scheduled for February 6. It will be attended by the United States ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, Pamela L. Spratlen; Kyrgyzstan’s Minister of Public Health, Dinara Saginbaeva; other representatives from the Ministry of Public Health; representatives from the medical facilities receiving the donated medicines, as well as representatives from Project HOPE.
“The people of Kyrgyzstan are very grateful to Project HOPE and its corporate partners for this generous donation of medicines,” said Marat Kaliev, Deputy Minister of Health in Kyrgyzstan. “With this shipment, we will be able to provide high-quality medication to those who need it.”
Including this most recent airlift, the total value of humanitarian aid Project HOPE has delivered to Kyrgyzstan in the last 14 months is more than $29 million. In 2011, Project HOPE delivered over $25 million of donated medicines and medical supplies to the country.
Project HOPE has been addressing the medical needs of communities across Central Asia since the fall of the Soviet Union. The organization has made tuberculosis and HIV prevention and treatment among at-risk populations in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan a top priority by supplying medicines, medical supplies and health education.
About Project HOPE
Founded in 1958, Project HOPE (Health Opportunities for People Everywhere) is dedicated to providing lasting solutions to health crises, with the mission of helping people to help themselves. Identifiable to many by the SS HOPE, the world’s first peacetime hospital ship, Project HOPE now conducts land-based medical training and health education programs in more than 35 countries across five continents.