HEALTH THROUGH EMPOWERMENT
Community Health Council works in settings of poverty with the goal of primary healthcare for all. CHC’s Community Health Clinics are places people can go for primary care, even in regions of extreme poverty.
At our founding in 2012, the Community Health Council had one goal … to provide basic healthcare to those who did not have regular access to it. We began by holding mobile clinics, working with partner organizations, local medical professionals and volunteers from the United States. Focusing on those who could not make the trip to the doctor or for whom it was extraordinarily difficult, like those in the remote communities of Loreto, Peru, we brought the clinic to them. We could not have accomplished this without the partnership of Amazon Promise.
In 2014, we expanded our mobile clinics into the mountains of Haiti. Hours outside of Port-au-Prince, we met the wonderful people of Oranger, Zorange and Fayette, Haiti, who forever changed the course of CHC. After working with local Haitian physicians, we learned that as many as fifty-percent of the doctors in Haiti are unemployed. This was the impetus for the next phase of CHC.
Our future is “Health through Empowerment“. Our mission is to “work to empower local doctors to start clinics in settings of extreme poverty.” We are working with local doctors and nurses to open clinics in the areas with the most dire need. Scroll down to learn more.
CHC MISSION STATEMENT
“CHC empowers local doctors to start clinics in settings of extreme poverty.”
CHC Mission: Defined
“CHC empowers local doctors to start clinics in settings of extreme poverty.” What does this mean? In many settings of extreme poverty around the world, as many as half of the doctors are unemployed. Either they can’t find work in medicine or have abandoned medicine, altogether, to pursue careers that provide them a living wage. At the same time, three-billion people lack access to primary medical care, globally.
This is where CHC hopes to help. While we continue to offer free healthcare through our mobile clinics in the areas with the most extreme need, CHC is partnering with local medical professionals to open primary care clinics in areas like Oranger, Haiti.
CHC Community Health Clinics are run by doctors and nurses from within the community, providing scientifically-sound medical care. By charging those who can afford it a very small fee for a visit, we will be able to pay our local medical professionals a living wage and help the clinic to be self-sustaining. CHC provides the needed equipment, medication, supplies and physical location to open the clinic, as well as ongoing support. This ongoing support can take the form of anything needed for the success of the clinic. We hope to open many more Community Health Clinics and need your help. Please visit our Support + Donate and Volunteer pages to find out how to help. Thank you!
OUR HISTORY
The story of the Community Health Council begins in Belen, Peru in 2012. CHC’s co-founder, Adam Frange, was volunteering with the Gesundheit! Institute at an orphanage in Belen where he witnessed two disasters to hit the community in quick succession. First a catastrophic flood, then a massive fire. In total, over a thousand wood homes were destroyed and three people were killed. The local community called this the Christmas Fire, as the events occurred on December 20th, 2012.
Upon returning home to New York, Adam was forever changed by what he saw.
CHC was created in November of 2012, but, after the Christmas Fire, it had a purpose.
Before the Christmas Fire, the residents of Belen were living in extreme poverty. The damage caused by the twin tragedies worsened the situation. Children were running around barefoot; drinking dirty, sewage-tainted water. Untreated illnesses, such as fungal infections, anemia and tuberculosis, were rampant, and access to medical care was scarce.
Adam saw an opportunity for CHC to help. He met with his long-time friend, CHC co-founder Nick Glasnovich, and they came up with a plan. Because of the lack of medical relief in Belen, Nick and Adam organized medical care for this catastrophe-stricken community.
By 2012, Adam had spent much of his life focusing on global health and developed a deep understanding of non-profit healthcare. Nick was a marketer with experience as an entrepreneur. Adam and Nick joined with a third co-founder, Joseph Glasnovich, as a head of finance.
The CHC team began hiring a staff of doctors and health professionals from the US and abroad, raising funds and operating free clinics in Peru and, later, Haiti. Over time, the impact of these free healthcare programs would grow, reaching over 35,000 patients.
Over time, the downsides of the free healthcare through mobile clinics model became increasingly apparent. Through our work, we saw many people become reliant on charity healthcare only to have that charity stop leave their community a year or two later due to the transient nature of charity healthcare.
This led to the new CHC Community Health Clinics model. We are implementing a strategy that will serve theses communities continuously.
CHC Community Health Clinics deliver care at a cost the community can afford to maintain. Those who cannot afford to pay will not be turned away. Treatment will remain free for patients who need it. Once set up, Community Health Clinics serve the community indefinitely, even in cases where foreign aid is withdrawn. Community Health Clinics provide scientifically sound and socially acceptable primary care. This is our strategy of achieving health for all through primary care and it is changing the way global health is delivered.
“The Community Health Council is an organization that provides healthcare and social services to the poorest of the poor in the world. Our work involves working with populations that lack basic social services such as primary healthcare, education and basic infrastructure. We work with local doctors and nurses to open local clinics that serve their communities. We accomplish this mission through partnership with regional governments, local leaders, donors, universities, and other nonprofit organizations. We work with refugee populations and the extremely poor in Haiti, and a region in northeastern Peru in the Amazon Jungle. The CHC was founded in 2012 because we felt the need to help people suffering in conditions of extreme poverty.
“It was important to me to co-found Community Health Council because I felt moved by the poverty, stresses, and illnesses of people, families, living in settings of extreme poverty. The way that I concluded was the most meaningful and rewarding way to spend a large portion of my life is through working with people in need of the help I could provide. I thought that there are few ways to spend time that could be so rewarding as helping people in so profound a way and, more than this, to accomplish this end as a team consisting of close friends. I feel it’s an honor to spend my time in this way, and the work we are accomplishing is, without question, extremely important, and urgent, and that feels good every day.”
Adam Frange“The Community Health Council is an organization that provides healthcare and social services to the poorest of the poor in the world. Our work involves working with populations that lack basic social services such as primary healthcare, education and basic infrastructure. We work with local doctors and nurses to open local clinics that serve their communities. We accomplish this mission through partnership with regional governments, local leaders, donors, universities, and other nonprofit organizations. We work with refugee populations and the extremely poor in Haiti, and a region in northeastern Peru in the Amazon Jungle. The CHC was founded in 2012 because we felt the need to help people suffering in conditions of extreme poverty.
“It was important to me to co-found Community Health Council because I felt moved by the poverty, stresses, and illnesses of people, families, living in settings of extreme poverty. The way that I concluded was the most meaningful and rewarding way to spend a large portion of my life is through working with people in need of the help I could provide. I thought that there are few ways to spend time that could be so rewarding as helping people in so profound a way and, more than this, to accomplish this end as a team consisting of close friends. I feel it’s an honor to spend my time in this way, and the work we are accomplishing is, without question, extremely important, and urgent, and that feels good every day.”
Adam Frange“The Community Health Council is an organization that provides healthcare and social services to the poorest of the poor in the world. Our work involves working with populations that lack basic social services such as primary healthcare, education and basic infrastructure. We work with local doctors and nurses to open local clinics that serve their communities. We accomplish this mission through partnership with regional governments, local leaders, donors, universities, and other nonprofit organizations. We work with refugee populations and the extremely poor in Haiti, and a region in northeastern Peru in the Amazon Jungle. The CHC was founded in 2012 because we felt the need to help people suffering in conditions of extreme poverty.
“It was important to me to co-found Community Health Council because I felt moved by the poverty, stresses, and illnesses of people, families, living in settings of extreme poverty. The way that I concluded was the most meaningful and rewarding way to spend a large portion of my life is through working with people in need of the help I could provide. I thought that there are few ways to spend time that could be so rewarding as helping people in so profound a way and, more than this, to accomplish this end as a team consisting of close friends. I feel it’s an honor to spend my time in this way, and the work we are accomplishing is, without question, extremely important, and urgent, and that feels good every day.”
Adam FrangePHOTOS FROM HAITI
PHOTOS FROM PERU
