Bringing the Light to Rural Ethiopia, a Doctor’s Story

Perceptions by Gerry Warner

What makes good people do extraordinary good things? Not just good things that you’d expect good people to do, but things that are truly extraordinary. You may be thinking, why am I posing such a question.  Let me tell you why.

Mark this date on your calendar if you will.

On Monday evening  Aug. 27 at 7 p.m. at the College of the Rockies lecture theatre (Rm. 250), Dr. James Guzek, an ophthalmologist from Richland, Washington, will be speaking and making a Power Point presentation on his work conducting free cataract surgery in rural Ethiopia.

Much like our own Dr. Bob Cutler, who’s been conducting free medical clinics in rural Haiti for years, Guzek is now in his third year of doing cataract clinics in a remote part of western Ethiopia, a country of more than 85 million with a long history that some believe goes back to the Garden of Eden.

I met Dr. Guzek when I participated in Cranbrook’s Sunrise Rotary Club’s  “Pedal for Polio” fundraiser in June when he addressed a large crowd of Rotarians at the organization’s spring conference  in Richland. He’s a very eloquent speaker and totally engaged the crowd with his presentation and I’m sure he’ll do the same here.

I’ve since done a bit of research on Ethiopia which is an ancient country with a history almost as long as Egypt and has some fascinating connections to Western culture even though it’s far from the main centres of Western civilization. It would probably surprise many of you to know that Ethiopians share the same faith that many Canadians do with close to half the population Christian and a third Muslim and many other smaller denominations. With a volatile mix of cultures and ethnic groups, Ethiopia has been racked with violence and war throughout its history yet it’s one of the few African countries that almost completely escaped colonization by the West except for a brief occupation by Italy prior to World War II. Ethiopia is the source of the mighty Nile River and is largely agrarian but very poor with an annual average income of less than $1,000-a-year and a literacy rate of about 30 per cent.

Despite these somewhat grim statistics Ethiopia has the second largest non-oil economy in Africa and its economy has been growing rapidly in recent years and tourists are beginning to flock to the country with its unique mix of cultures, wildlife and scenery. It also has a surprisingly pleasant, high altitude climate with much of the country lying on a high plateau over 6,000 feet close to the equator. Addis Ababa, the capital at 2,440 meters (8,850 feet) is almost as high as Mt. Fisher and features everything from mud huts to glitzy hotels and Medieval cathedrals. No wonder the tourists are coming!

But Dr. Guzek’s work is conducted far from all this in Dembi Dolo, a small farming city in dusty west Ethiopia far from the rapidly modernizing metropolis of Addis Ababa . The clinic, staffed by local nurses and one visiting Ethiopian ophthalmologist, is not literally “free” thanks to fundraising by Rotarians in the Tri-Cities area. But thanks to Dr. Guzek’s efforts and other volunteers the curse of blindness in the developing world is being lifted and light is literally being brought to a part of the world that needs it most.

Dr. Guzek talks of an Ethiopian mother, who because of cataracts raised two of her children without ever seeing them. “She had four children that she had nursed and diapered without ever seeing two of them. Can you imagine how she felt when she could see them? ”Imagine her feeling indeed. I think all of us would be hard pressed to do that.

Yet, like this part of the world including Canada and the U.S., one of the main medical problems in Ethiopia is getting physicians, especially specialists, to practice in rural areas. Obviously the needed support facilities aren’t there. Nor is the money and resources, a familiar refrain heard even in the developed world. As a result, Dr. Guzek, in conjunction with Ethiopian specialists is involved in a unique project to train local Ethiopian nurses to do some cataract surgery themselves, thus bringing “the light” to where it has not been brought before.

It’s a fascinating story and one that you can experience for yourself at COTR Monday. As for why a physician like Dr. Guzek would leave the comfort of his home practice to do this, you’ll have to ask him yourself.

Gerry Warner is a retired journalist and Cranbrook City Councillor. His views are his own and he does not speak for Council.