U.S. groups join up to send medical supplies

WASHINGTON (JP): A group of American business and nonprofit organizations is sending US$1.7 million in medical supplies to Indonesia to help the crisis-stricken country.

Mark Schlansky, a Boeing executive and the chairman of Uplift International, said the group had identified certain essential materials, such as insulin, antibiotics, analgesics and syringes, in short supply at Indonesian hospitals.

Uplift International is a nonprofit organization that specializes in medical airlifts.

Schlansky told reporters in Washington, D.C. on Thursday that the three metric tons of medical supplies would be delivered free of charge by a Federal Express MD-11 airplane.

The plane is scheduled to arrive at Jakarta's Sukarno-Hatta International Airport on Sept. 11.

A team from Uplift International will escort the supplies from the airport to Indonesian hospitals to make sure they are delivered to the right destinations, he said.

"We will have our people go with it all the way right to the hospitals."

Four public hospitals are due to receive the aid: Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital in Jakarta; Dr. Soetomo Hospital in Surabaya, East Java; Dr. Wahidin Sudirohusodo Hospital in Ujungpandang, South Sulawesi; and Prof. Dr. W.Z. Johannes Hospital in Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara.

Schlansky said Uplift International had been working with the Indonesian government and the World Health Organization to identify which hospitals were in greatest need based on geographical and distributional systems.

Garuda Indonesia and Merpati Nusantara Airlines will fly the supplies to the hospitals outside Jakarta for free.

Schlansky said he hoped such medical aid would continue on a regular basis, adding that his organization was currently making another assessment for a second aid shipment to the country.

More than two dozen U.S. companies are participating in the project, including American International Group, Boeing, Caterpillar, Federal Express, Ford Motor Co., Goodyear Tire & Rubber, Mobil Oil and Procter & Gamble.

Joining Uplift in the project are Project Hope, the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council and the U.S.-Indonesia Society. (Yenni Djahidin)