I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, where we ranked as the eighth largest city in the United States. We were all proud of our city and felt it was the gateway to the Midwest and indeed the “rest” of the United States.
We manufactured automobiles and other products that were used all over our country. Charitable giving was important if you wanted social status. Membership in certain social clubs was dependent on giving at least 10 percent of your income for charity, and you had to prove it with tax returns.
This charitable giving was in the 1950s and 1960s, and the United States was different then. There was more continuity in communities and people did not move around the country as much. We were close to our friends and neighbors. My parent’s friends were people we would visit frequently and, like my parents, were very “Cleveland” and charitable.
Recently, on a trip to Cleveland, a cousin hearing about my work in Africa suggested I connect with these family friends again. He said they had developed a way of getting medical supplies to the developing world and started a nonprofit called MedWish. I promptly called our old family friend and went to see what they were doing.
Visiting their organization for the first time last May was amazing. They are able to get the supplies they collect to the rest of the world. MedWish International started in 1993 by Lee Ponsky. His mother is the daughter of our family friends and was raised in the tradition of charitable Cleveland.
According to MedWish’s history, “As an undergraduate student, Lee (Ponsky) had the life-changing opportunity to work as a scrub technician in Nigeria, Africa. It was there that he witnessed firsthand the appalling lack of basic medical supplies and understood the tremendous need for those supplies around the world. Incorporated in January of 1994, MedWish has grown from a grassroots organization primarily providing hand-carry humanitarian packets to an organization filling 40-foot sea containers.”
On Friday, I visited MedWish again, spending more than two hours talking with CEO Kristen Bihary and walking though the huge, 40,000-square-foot warehouse in Cleveland.
Supplies were lined up and ready to be taken to conflict areas and places in Africa. The previous week, doctors from Ukraine had walked the warehouse finding medical supplies they could take back with them to treat patients caught in the conflict. To walk the warehouse is to be transported to a wonderland of medical supplies. There are kits for wound suturing and wheelchairs and medicine-dispensing machines. There are beds and centrifuges and wheelchairs, among other supplies.
MedWish relies on volunteers to sort though donations from doctors and hospitals, but it also provides meaningful work to differently abled workers who are able to sort though supplies in what used to be called a “sheltered workshop.” The workers can develop pride in the fact that they are not just sorting but helping to bring supplies to people who are less fortunate.
Since 2013, MedWish has made 199 shipments of supplies and had 42,000 volunteer hours to ensure supplies are sent and packaged according to standards and arrive safe and also sterile. Since its beginning in 1993, MedWish has delivered supplies to 90 countries.
Last July, MedWish shipped its 1,500th order. Its motto is “repurpose, save lives.” These are products that doctors and hospitals don’t use and would be thrown out. Now, because of MedWish, they are going to countries that desperately need the supplies.
In an era of fear about Ebola, MedWish is a lifesaver for health-care workers who need supplies and gowns and resources.
In May, I walked the warehouse with a physician from South Sudan. His eyes lit up! In a country that has little or no supplies, MedWish can go a very long way to supplying many of the needs he identified.
One young man, Lee Ponsky, started this before he became a doctor. One person changed many lives. He took action. He grew up in a family and city that supported him and his quest to “do good.” He has done “good” in way that few people can. He is a hero with a life-saving organization.
Media wishing to interview Ellen Ratner, please contact [email protected].
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