BASE NEWS: Medical diplomacy wins hearts and minds

Embed on Naval Hospital Ship Comfort | The U.S. Naval Hospital Ship Comfort is on a historic goodwill mission.

The Comfort, home-ported in Baltimore, is halfway through its four-month, seven-nation humanitarian mission dubbed Continuing Promise 2009 (CP09). Missions like CP09 are a crucial component of the U.S. Southern Command’s Theater Security Cooperation Strategy that seeks strong regional partnerships among nations in order to enhance stability and security.

The Comfort’s goodwill mission is part of “medical diplomacy.” That is “the winning of hearts and minds of people in the Middle East, Asia, Africa and elsewhere by exporting medical care, expertise and personnel to help those who need it most,” said former Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy G. Thompson.

The mission to date has been a huge success. According to the U.S. Southern Command, the men and women of the Comfort have had more than 100,000 patient encounters so far from their visits to Haiti, Dominican Republic, Antigua and Barbuda. The Comfort has many more hearts and minds to win on the second half of the mission to Panama, Colombia, El Salvador and Nicaragua before it returns to the United States on July 31.

Baldwin Spencer, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, described the ship’s May 5-16 visit to his twin-island nation as “the touch of humanity.”

“We are hoping that this visit cements the friendship between our two countries. We thank you for all the fine gratitude and love that you shared with us the last 11 days,” Mr. Spencer said.

The prime minister’s sentiments were echoed by Capt. Bob Lineberry, mission commander for CP09. Capt. Lineberry was a guest of honor at the Comfort closing ceremony in Antigua and Barbuda. “As we depart, we leave with many valued memories and a true sense of accomplishment that our Continuing Promise mission has seen to the needs of many people as well as strengthen our already strong relationship with the Antiguan and Barbudan people,” he said.

The 894-foot-long floating hospital that displaces 69,360 long tons with a speed of 17.5 knots is not a typical Navy ship. It is painted white with red crosses and is an interagency, international and nongovernmental organization (NGO) cooperation. No other ship in the U.S. Navy comes close to having as many civilians assigned to it as does the Comfort.

Interagency partners assigned as part of Comfort’s crew include the U.S. Army, Air Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, Public Health Service, State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development.

There are medical personnel onboard from the Netherlands, Canada, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, France and Nicaragua. In the first three nations visited, the Dutch contingent of eight personnel performed 23 percent of all the surgeries that occurred in Comfort’s five operating rooms.

“[The Dutch] thought of us a lot,” said Navy Cmdr. Tom Donohue.

Nearly two dozen NGOs are involved with this mission, including Project Hope, Operation Smile, Latter Day Saints, Rotary International, Lions Club and Project Handclasp.

The NGOs bring volunteers to the ship for weeks at a time, often at their own expense, for different portions of the mission as well as in-kind donations of much-needed supplies, such as used eyeglasses medical packets. Supplies worth more than $350,000 were donated in Antigua and Barbuda alone. Similar results occur on each of Comfort’s visits throughout the seven-nation mission.

The Comfort’s voyage has been ground-breaking. On May 12, tele-medicine history was made when the Comfort became the first ship to broadcast a surgery back to Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda. The broadcast has made a “long, lasting military medicine impact,” said Cmdr. Donohue.

CP09 also marks the first time that an acupuncturist has been assigned to a Navy ship - a volunteer with the University of California at San Diego’s Pre-Dental Society. The U.S. Air Force Band also became the first air force band to be assigned to a Navy ship.

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