Thursday, August 18, 2011

The Karen Woo Foundation is a new grant-giving Charity, focusing on supporting projects in Afghanistan which provide healthcare to communities which have little or no access to even basic medical provision.

Decades of conflict and years of drought had destroyed much of Afghanistan prior to September 2001. Almost all social services and government infrastructures were destroyed; food shortages were widespread and millions of talented Afghans emmigrated to other countries. 

After the collapse of the Taliban regime in 2001, despite a decade of efforts by international community, Afghanistan still remains one of the world’s poorest and most dangerous countries. There has been a resurgence of violence,  insurgency, political instability, the economy has collapsed and importantly there is little to no health care system in many parts of the country. People need peace, security, education, food, and most importantly health care and medical supplies.

To help the people of Afghanistan, Karen Woo visited many hospitals in Afghanistan and became aware of server shortages of medical supplies and little to no health care system. Karen Woo with the support of several organisations collected medical supplies to send to Kabul. Almost a year before Karen was tragically shot and killed in Afghanistan and she did not see those goods being delivered. However, her finance Paddy Smith with her other friends vowed to carry on with the task of getting the supplies delivered to Kabul as aimed by Karen.

A large container filled with boxes of surgical gloves, syringes, tissues, swabs and other medical supplies destined for hospitals in Kabul.

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