Health, War, and Economics in Congo

Congo has been in the news a lot lately, so I was excited to attend the Quest Global Presence meeting tonight to hear Harper McConnell talk about the work that HEAL Africa does in the Democratic Republic of Congo. HEAL Africa runs a tertiary care/teaching hospital in Goma, Congo staffed by 16 Congolese doctors and 28 nurses who specialize in orthopedic and gynecological surgeries. These areas of specialization are the unfortunate result of a high volume of patients injured by the violence of war and rape.

Following the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, Hutu militias were forced across the border into Congo. Since that time a number of factions and rebel groups, some backed by neighboring governments, have been at war in Congo. The current fighters around Goma include the Tutsi rebels lead by General Laurent Nkunda whose stated aim is to protect Congolese Tutsis from the Hutu FLDR militias. However, they are also considering overthrowing the Congolese government, so they are fighting the government troops and the pro-government Mai-Mai militias as well as attacking the UN peacekeeping troops. Here are a few articles with background info:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/africa/7720738.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/africa/7714629.stm

I don’t know a lot about the history and politics of the conflict, but from a healthcare perspective one of the major results is civilian casualties. The doctors and nurses in Goma are doing heroic work to take care of patients wounded by the conflict, and you can donate via the HEAL Africa website (a surgery costs around $400).

In addition to caring for individual patients, public health principles teach us that some of the greatest value per effort comes from primary prevention and attacking the root causes of disease. In this case that means attacking the economic base of support for rebel groups (running an army is pretty expensive). As was the case with conflict diamonds, natural mineral resources play an important role in financing the fighting in Congo. Specifically, coltan (columbite-tantalite) is an ore that can supply the raw material for tantalum capacitors found in most cell phones, laptops, etc. 80% of the coltan reserves are found in Congo, so Senators Brownback (R-KS) and Derben (D-IL) have introduced bipartisan legislation to set up a certification process for coltan in order to ensure that the manufacture of your cell phone and laptop is not indirectly financing the killing of women and children in Congo. A globalized world requires us to exercise global responsibility, so I would urge you to write to your senators and ask them to co-sponsor or support SB 3058, the Conflict Coltan and Cassiterite Act of 2008. You can find a sample letter here and your senators' contact info here.