News

Tibetan Healing Fund needs your support to help us meet the most critical needs of children and families affected by the earthquake in Tso-Ngon (Ch: Qinghai) Province. A rapid series of strong earthquakes hit a mountainous and impoverished area of Tso-Ngon (Ch: Qinghai) Province early Wednesday April 14th. With the death toll rising sharply killing 2,039 people, another 195 people were still missing at least 12,135 others were injured, of whom 1,434 were in serious condition, state agency said, citing rescue headquarters on Monday April 19th. Many victims, including school children, were buried under debris. 15,000 homes and buildings collapsed and 100,000 people have nowhere to live. The epicenter of the 7.1 magnitude earthquake was about 30 miles away from Jiegu Township, which has a population of 250,000 in and around the town.

Tibetan Healing Fund has been working in the regions of Tso-Ngon (Ch: Qinghai) Province since 2001. THF’s founder, Dr. Kunchok Gyaltsen was born and raised in Tso-Ngon (Ch: Qinghai) Province and most of our in-country staff, friends and family members of Tibetan Trustees, board members and friends live in and around this area affected by the earthquake.

“Initial reports indicate extensive damage in Yushu county, with continuing aftershocks,” says Alex Mahoney, regional manager for the American Red Cross programs in Asia. “When earthquakes happen, we expect to see immediate needs for food, water, temporary shelter, medical services and emotional support, as well as for warm clothing and quilts due to the location of this quake.”

More than 85 percent of houses in Gyegu have collapsed, a prefecture official told Xinhua. "Many are buried in the collapsed houses, and there are still lots of others who are injured and being treated at local hospitals," he said. The Hong Kong Red Cross said 90 percent of houses throughout Yushu had collapsed.

Your donation will help us provide immediate relief and urgently needed medical attention and other necessities and long-term support through health care and education, technical assistance and other support to help those in need.

We also need to look beyond immediate relief, to the Tibetan people’s longer-term needs as they recover from this enormous tragedy and begin to rebuild their communities. Aside from the human toll—which continues to climb—this earthquake has robbed thousands of people of their homes and livelihoods, in an area that is already one the poorest regions.

Please help us by making donations that will be used to help our friends in Tibetan regions re-build their lives and receive the care they need.

THF assures you that all funds donated through the Tibetan Healing Fund Earthquake Relief will go directly to assisting the people of the devastated communities. Please donate on line via pay-pal or send a check to the Seattle office.

Photos from Yushu can be seen at these websites. Some are distressing.

http://blog.163.com/qhhlzx_007/blog/static/443803201031513017215/

http://blog.163.com/qhhlzx_007/blog/static/443803201031512310100/

http://blog.163.com/qhhlzx_007/blog/static/4438032010315141420/

Annual Appeal 2009

First, I would like to offer my personal thanks for supporting Tibetan Healing Fund’s work this year. I have been continually astonished by the generosity of Tibetan Healing Fund’s donors; your giving has not been limited to financial support but also includes your volunteer hours, public relations efforts, words of support and encouragement, and championing of our mission. We are grateful and humbled. I am delighted to be able to share with you the remarkable achievements you have made possible. We have included with the end of the year Annual Appeal, THF’s special edition newsletter Giving Birth to Hope - Building a Birth Center for the Next Generation of Tibetans, which includes three letters fromTibetan Healing Fund’s in-country local Tibetan partners of the Birth Center.

In 2009, a dream turned to reality for Tibetan residents of Rebkong when the Tibetan Birth Center opened on July 25th. The $90,000 USD Birth Center was designed based on the concepts of modern community oriented primary health care in public health in the United States. It is a center for providing mothers and children safe, affordable, linguistically and culturally appropriate health services and medicines. Also, its mission is to provide health education to the mothers and their husbands. The center’s services are based on Tibetan medicine, local culture, and modern medicine.

Tibetan Healing Fund aims to make the Birth Center a model facility and one that can be replicated in other areas of need. The Birth Center will be a force to improve maternal and child health care in remote and rural areas of Tibet and we strive for it to be a major component of the health care system. We are hoping to have a positive impact in terms of increasing utilization of high quality health care services, which will reduce mortality and morbidity among women and children.

Health care service provided at the Birth Center during August, September and October 2009:

Service Categories (people serviced)	August	September	October
Ultrasound Exam	35	46	63
Contraceptive Services	20	15	36
Delivery	6	11	13
Gynecological Exam	35	47	134
Health Education	96	119	245

The Birth Center could not have been conceived or begun without the financial support of our donors in the USA as well as donations of time, resources, and medical equipment from local Tibetan and Chinese friends. In a very real sense, the Birth Center in Rebkong and Tibetan Healing Fund USA have become part of one very large, extended family. And, like a family, we have shared goals, values and hopes, and a commitment to providing access to safe health services; paramount among all of the values we share is a firm dedication to healthy mothers and children, free of sickness and suffering.

Since 2005, THF has trained Tibetan medical students to assess needs and educate over 12,000 rural Tibetan women. Rural women received culturally and linguistically appropriate health education on women’s physiology and health, family heath, hygiene, nutrition, infectious diseases, such as HIV/AIDS and TB and disease prevention. During the summer of 2009, fifty Tibetan medical students from mSo-Ngon University Tibetan Medical College travelled to rural Tibetan villages in the Tibetan Autonomous Region, Qinghai, Gansu and Sichuan Provinces to provide maternal and child healthcare to 3,000 Tibetan women.

In 2009, I had the opportunity and privilege to travel nationwide to present at various universities, businesses, social organizations and medical groups. These events gave me and the other THF members a wonderful opportunity to meet people from all over the country and talk to them about Tibet, Tibetan Medicine, culture, the educational and health needs of Tibetans. In addition, to increase outreach events and create awareness about Tibet and raise funds for THF projects, we recently created new Fundraising Branches in New York City, Charlottesville Virginia and Dallas Texas.

Increase the number of village level community midwives able to assist with safe delivery (prenatal, delivery and postpartum care) and to arrange for emergency transport if complications arise. THF has already conducted trainings for 20 village women; future trainings will be at the birth center.
Provide additional training to Tibetan primary and secondary teachers to improve their teaching skills and knowledge of child development; 550 teachers have already received training.
Expand on the success of the Tibetan Heritage Primer Textbooks that provides students reading materials and educates young Tibetans about their culture, history and native language. 9,000 textbooks have already been published.
Add to the 300 primary students THF has supported to complete their primary education.
Provides scholarships for postgraduate and medical school students-support women who seek higher education in public health, medicine and education.

As we build on our past successes and move into our 9th year of providing healthcare and education, I want to emphasize that it is your generosity that makes all of this possible. Please help us make miracles (small or large) happen. For example, $50 allows primary school students to read textbooks in their native language; $155 provides medical kits for community midwives; $350 helps village women attend community midwife training or help rural teachers attend teacher training; $1,000 sends Tibetan medical students to rural villages, sharing important health information or provides rural village school improvements.

On behalf of Tibetan children and their families, I send you our sincere gratitude for your support and your commitment to THF’s mission to improve the healthcare and education for rural Tibetan children and their families in the Tibetan regions of P.R. China. Thank you for helping us pave the way for a healthier and better educated Tibet. From everyone at Tibetan Healing Fund, may there be peace, good fortune and compassion with your loved ones and friends in 2010. Happy Holidays and a Blessed New Year!

Kunchok Gyaltsen
Tibetan Medical Doctor (TMD), MIIM, MPH, PhD(c.)
Founder and Board President