The 2020 was an extremely difficult year for everyone, but especially for people living in refugee camps in Lesvos, Greece.
Since the start of the lockdown in April 2020 due to Covid 19, followed by the great fire of Moria camp in September 2020, the situation of the thousands of refugees has become a very difficult tragedy to handle.
Despite all the obstacles, Earth Medicine Physical Rehabilitation, has continued to work and give treatments to those who need it most.
With great satisfaction we have assisted 163 patients, who have received long-term physical rehabilitation, which means that each patient attended a session 3 or 4 times a week.
The graph clearly shows the decrease in patients during the months of April 2020, due to the quarantine Covid-19 and September, due to the fire that completely burned the Moria camp.
Our achievements in 2020
Without a doubt, our work could not have been possible without the support of many individuals people and organizations who have trusted us and who have seen that this project is important to improve the health of people living in refugee camps.
Despite the difficulties of 2020, we have made important achievements that have improved the health of many of our patients.
2020 was a year of consolidation for Earth Medicine Physical Rehabilitation project. We got other organizations to know our work and support us financially.
We were also able to start working with Armut und Gesundheit and Dr. Gerhard Trabert to raise awareness about the situation of handicap people living in refugees camp. Our greatest wish is that these people be evacuated and relocated in other countries where they can have dignified medical attention.
The health of many paraplegic people and other disabilities deteriorates tremendously within refugee camps.
Thanks to the work and commitment of Dr. Gerhard Trabert, we have managed to transfer several handicap people to Germany. There are not many, but we hope it will be the beginning of a great relocation campaign for highly vulnerable people.
Zenaib with her new Prosthetic leg, Cerebral Palsy wheelchair for Rahmatulla Heydari, whith cerebral palsy desorder, and Electric Wheelchair for Khalid Alafat, with brain injury after a bomb explotion.
For Zenaib, living in Moria camp and having to go up and down hills was almost impossible. To go to the bathroom she had to walk 20 minutes and wait 1 hour standing in a queue to shower.
The prosthetic leg that was already old did not resist the hilly terrain of Moria camp and broke dawn.
Dr. Gerhard Trabert managed to manufacture a new prosthetic leg in Germany and bring it to Lesvos.
In November 2020, finally Zenaib had her new Prosthetic leg brand new.
Also, at the end of November 2020 Earth Medicine received a great donation: Space-Eye sent us two living container to be used for rehabilitation treatment. This is a great help for our patient as we were straggling with our small clinic-container in Kara Tepe.
New Container-clinic for Earth Medicine Physical rehabilitation in Lesvos.
As we are still in lockdown, we are unable to tranfer our container to the camp, but we hope to do it in the following months.
In November 2020, Abdulkarim Shahoud and Wael Shahoud were tranfered to Germany, after living terrible conditions at Moria camp.
In June 2020, we managed a tranfer request for an Afghan family with a handicap child to Germany. This was an incredible happy moment, as this extremely vulnerable family was living in Kara Tepe camp with 4 young children and a father with a hip injury.
Currently they are living in Berlin.
We wanted to share a brief overview of what we have accomplished in 2020.
On behalf of our patient we would like to thank each one of you for your enormous support, love and compassion.
With gratitude
Fabiola Velasquez