Before coming to medical school I remember browsing through the various overseas volunteering projects that the school offers and signed up eagerly when the opportunity came. I also remembered stumbling upon and casually considering various paid medical volunteerism agencies e.g. GapMedics (volunteering in a local village in Dominican Republic for instance) to “build my CV” for my med school application.
So naturally, when I got rejected by those aforementioned projects, I was more disheartened than I would like to be. These CIP projects were practically the reason I transferred back to Singapore (🇸🇬 ok not the only reason for obvious reasons, the cheaper tuition fees and closeness to home and family played a bigger role). Then my boyfriend comforted me and said that I was better off doing something else anyway since the potential of me making an impact on local causes were greater and far more meaningful and sustainable. I wasn’t fully convinced at the time but shortly after, I couldn’t agree more.
Be it overseas medical electives (which the med schools all around the world allocate time for students to do) or medical volunteering projects that one takes up in their spare time, it all seems to be of a self-serving nature rather than being helpful to the local community. What happened to “Do No Harm”?
Why I have issues with this:
- Filling gaps rather than building on existing capacities, not fixing structural problems and rather creating a dependency on foreign resources
- Long-term partnerships with local authorities to allow more structural, preventative policies and strategies to improve local health over time
- Poor health is predominantly a consequence of poverty (shifting the burden archetype – you are treating the symptom and not the root problem)
- Funds spent in medical volunteering industry can be more effectively allocated elsewhere e.g. improving local services, donations of medications and equipment
“Wanting to help is not enough. One must understand global poverty and its many derivatives, or medical help has a band-aid function at best.”
“Going abroad with a mental picture of how photos and stories will impress people at home starts already on the wrong foot.” (this reminds me of people in my school)
References:
Bauer, I. More harm than good? The questionable ethics of medical volunteering and international student placements. Trop Dis Travel Med Vaccines 3, 5 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40794-017-0048-y
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