Posted on 06/15/2007 1:35:18 PM PDT by devane617
The U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort will be sailing off Florida waters on Sunday en route to Latin America and the Caribbean -- and The Miami Herald will be on board for a first report on the mission.
President Bush has ordered the ship, with a mixed 500-plus military and civilian crew and staff, to spend three months on a 12-nation tour as a goodwill gesture.
The Baltimore-based ship left port in Norfolk, Va., on Friday morning in what the Pentagon's U.S. Southern Command is calling ``its first-ever, large-scale humanitarian assistance deployment to Central America, South America and the Caribbean.''
Southcom estimates that during the tour, which coincides with the Atlantic hurricane season, medical and dental teams on board the ship will collaborate with foreign medical staff to ``provide medical care to an estimated 85,000 patients from communities with limited healthcare access.''
Comfort is a former tanker as lengthy as three football fields, equipped with a helicopter landing pad and the ability to take on patients from the sea as well. On this mission, it is equipped with two operating rooms, a 50-bed hospital ward and a host of scanning, laboratory and analysis equipment.
Stops will include Belize, Guatemala, Panama, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Suriname.
A Miami Herald team anticipates posting a news update and web-video at www.miamiherald.com Sunday evening -- following up with a full news report in Monday morning's newspaper.
Meantime, to read more about Comfort, see http://www.comfort.navy.mil
Odd, I remember hepatitis and tuberculosis in the States before this wave of immigration. The rest of it requires facts rather than a broad statements implying immigrants are the cause of all our health problems.
Sorry, no. The key word there is "Command." MSC may charter civilian ships for their use and have ships manned by civilian mariners but they are part of the Department of Defense, not a civilian company.
The discussion was on the incremental impact of illegal aliens on the prevalence of disease -- not the total.
There is also the indirect impact on all medical costs.
This is no joke, and will bankrupt, and kill, many Americans.
It makes sense for Pres. Bush to send the ship to combat Cuban propaganda about Castro’s doctors helping the poor all over S. America. Every foreign policy decision isn’t about people crossing our borders. Sometimes it’s about fighting socialist and communist indoctrination.
If a parent is a US citizen or military person or if the ship is in a port or other territorial waters of the United States, then yes, the baby is a US citizen. Otherwise, probably not. Here’s the Fourteenth Amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” For the constitutional guarantee of citizenship, the birth must occur IN the United States and subject to its jurisdiction. A military vessel docked in a foreign port is not in the United States.
Does she play the violin?
Mine is going up at the end of the month by 24%. I only got three weeks notice...
I believe that the sending of these hospital ships on missions such as this has been the practice for the past thirty or forty years. The people that serve on them are mostly reservists who have to be called up for training periodically anyway if they are going to be competent in the event the hospital ship is mobilized quickly in an emergency. I suppose that the ship could just as well be sent to train off of Africa or in parts of Asia, but Central and South America are close, and it is operational time, not transit time, which the embarked personnel will gain from.
I think this exercise is just fine.
“Fine, mothball it.”
No, it’s an insurance policy for when we really do need it.
Wouldn’t it be cheaper just to wait for them to walk across the border?
Just what I have been saying all along. Only i would include prison time for employers who are caught hiring illegals the 2nd time. I don't think many of the CEOs and Board members of major agricultural and construction corporations that are big time users of cheap immigrant labor want to be seen in prison stripes on the cover of the WSJ and MONEY magazines.
>> to spend three months on a 12-nation tour as a goodwill gesture.
I guess the sacrifices the Military continues to make around the World and away from home and their families is not good enough for the politicians.
What’s happening to Dubya ?
Roger that. These ships are an indispensable resource and should be kept up staffed and available all of the time. That said, I guess I don't get what all the outrage is about. If there's no domestic event underway, why ~not~ send them on missions to places where they could do some good? Its a good thing to do, and its pretty cheap in the big picture. So what?
Project HOPE volunteers and United States Navy medical personnel will embark this month on a 12-city, 12-country humanitarian assistance mission to Central and South America on board the hospital ship USNS Comfort. The mission is one of three missions Project HOPE will partner with the U.S. Navy this year.
Staffed with Project HOPE volunteer doctors, nurses and other health care professionals,The U.S. Navy hospital ship Comfort will visit coastal communities in Belize, Guatemala, Panama, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Haiti, Trinidad & Tobago, Guyana and Surinam. Project HOPE will send 88 volunteers on this mission, in four rotations, each lasting approximately 23 days, to help treat an expected 85,000 patients – including 55,000 children.
Later this summer, the USS Peleliu will visit Southeast Asia including coastal communities in Vietnam (where the SS HOPE sailed during the second half of its maiden voyage in 1960), Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and the Marshall Islands. HOPE will send 63 volunteers on this mission, serving in three rotations, each lasting up to 19 days. In the fall, Project HOPE will accompany the Navy to West Africa.
Along with the volunteer support, Project HOPE is seeking to provide an estimated $6 million worth of donated medicines (including vaccines, antibiotics and basic supplies) in support of each operation.
The humanitarian voyages with the U.S. Navy will be similar in scope to the two previous joint missions - the 2005 Tsunami Response, which provided direct medical support on the ship and ashore to the victims of the December 2004 tsunami and the 2006 Mission of HOPE and Mercy which revisited the area to provide medical help and expertise to those still suffering from the effects of the tsunami.
Dr. Nick Morris, a surgeon, and his wife, Madelyn, a certified registered nurse specializing in surgery assistance, volunteered on the 2006 Mission of HOPE and Mercy. Dr. Morris described their seven week tour to Indonesia and East Timor in July, August and early September of 2006 as life changing.
This unique public-private partnership distinctly recalls the days of the SS HOPE hospital ship, and represents a rebirth of the volunteer spirit on which Project HOPE was founded 49 years ago. During its 14 years of service, from 1960 to 1974, the SS HOPE, staffed by medical volunteers, made 11 voyages to countries around the world – including several of those scheduled for visits by the Comfort and Peleliu this year (Vietnam, Peru, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Colombia). When it was retired, the SS HOPE had become a symbol of American goodwill and compassion.
http://www.projecthope.org/headlines/view.asp?id=12387964
Just a couple comments are truly bigoted, but the knee-jerk reactions are priceless.
Think of how well off we would all be if we didn't have to give 40% of everything we earn, to every third world country.
Besides, if we have another Katrina this summer, we could use the ship back here, not in Belize or somewhere.
Seems like “gratuitous pandering” to those that would rather be pandered to . . . to be more accurate.
Did we learn nothing from Bubbafucco the Clintonista’s using the USS Cole for nation building ?
Gheeeesh.........
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