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Health Links


Current health links projects

The health links group is also supporting the Camden Clinic, an out-of-hours and emergency clinic which is organised on a rota by Abu Dis doctors from different clinics. The clinic was started when Abu Dis had no emergency clinic because of the Separation Wall. Following the establishment in October 2008 of a 24-hour medical service funded by Norway at the Al Muqassed Clinic, the Camden Clinic continues to have a role, because its doctors have specialisms not found elsewhere in Abu Dis and because they can also treat patients who do not have Palestinian health insurance. We are helping them to subsidise the cost of some basic medicines.

Shehadeh Mohsen Diabetic Clinic

The number of diabetic cases in Abu Dis and the areas around is increasing. There are special programmes in the Jerusalem area to take care of such cases, but also there are patients who are not given permission by the Israelis to enter Jerusalem and they are not able to get the care that they need. Most of these are from the families of prisoners and people killed by the Israelis. Approximately 1000 people in Abu Dis and the adjacent villages of Sawahreh and Aizaria are ill with diabetes and also suffer from the Israeli refusal to give them permits to let them pass through the terminals in the Separation Wall to the hospitals in Jerusalem.

Even if they do get permits, there is no guarantee that patients will be allowed to pass. Two years ago, Shehadeh Mohsen, a diabetic patient from Abu Dis, who did have a permit to go through the checkpoint, was killed by the Israeli army trying to as they had declared a closure on that day but he wanted to get to his regular appointment in a Jerusalem hospital.

CADFA are grateful to the Parish of Hampshire Downs for the first big donation to enable a diabetic clinic to open at the Camden Clinic. The clinic opened in October 2009 - click here for Youtube link and see notices below:

Shehadeh Mohsen Clinic notice [Arabic] Shehadeh Mohsen Clinic notice [English] doc

Click here to go the Past Health Links Project page




Health in Abu Dis

Abu Dis suffers badly from the Wall in every respect but its effect on people's health is dramatic. The hospitals that Abu Dis relies on are in East Jerusalem, and the way to them is now blocked by the Occupation Wall. Doctors sent us calls for help as the Wall has blocked the way of their patients to hospital and people have been born at and died at checkpoints. There was no emergency out-of-hours service until the Camden Clinic opened in 2007 and no delivery room for mothers until the extension of the Al Muqassed Clinic at the end of 2008.  Two small clinics serve a population of roughly 16 or 17 thousand (including the student population at the Al Quds University), and medicine is often in short supply.

CADFA health links group

Camden Abu Dis Health Links brings together health professionals from across Camden, and works closely with a group of health professionals from Abu Dis who came together in response to CADFA and who welcome our support. If you work in the area of health or if this is your interest, we would be glad to hear from you.