• Supporting health care workers and hospitals: We're helping front-line health workers stay safe, nourished and empowered to better serve their patients by providing life-saving supplies and equipment, as well as remote training to bolster their response. 

• Ensuring the health and well-being of patients and their families: We’re providing nutritional assistance, hygiene kits and virtual health services to support people and their health needs so they can thrive. 

The pandemic has placed enormous stress on health workers and hospitals everywhere. Where health systems were already stretched beyond capacity, the strain can threaten their ability to effectively combat COVID-19.

By redirecting life-saving supplies such as like gloves, masks and gowns from our care centers and warehouses, we're keeping health workers safe from the virus.

Donations of personal protective equipment are being distributed around the world by our teams in Bolivia, Ghana, Guatemala, Honduras, Italy, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, South Africa, Egypt, Jordan, Madagascar, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Malawi, Philippines and Vietnam.

Our partner Medical Aid International made hundreds of thousands of these donations possible in Africa. With local and international supply chains disrupted, partnerships like this one are critical to bridge the gap.

Health workers also need adequate equipment to care for their patients now and into the future.

The ventilators we’ve donated are helping COVID-19 patients breathe. Plans are also underway to remodel and outfit intensive care units of hospitals where we work in Malawi, Madagascar, Mozambique, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, Morocco and Egypt. Alongside our partners Diamedica, KidsOR and Lifebox, we purchased 168 oxygen concentrators and 200 pulse oximeters for hospitals in Malawi, Madagascar, Mozambique, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, and Morocco.

Education and training are core components of Operation Smile's work and critical to our pandemic response. We're delivering essential basic life support training through distance learning, and leading virtual seminars to address challenges facing health workers in low- and middle-income countries so they can be better prepared to battle the virus.

We’ve entered a new reality. The way work will change drastically to enhance infection protection and control protocols. We’re strengthening our standards and continually evaluating the quality of care we deliver, so our patients receive the best possible results.

Around the world, we're supporting patients and their families in new ways, caring for their health and safety through this uncertain time.

In Managua, Nicaragua, we’re connecting patients who have received surgery with virtual speech therapy and psychosocial services over the internet and phone. Speech Therapist Scarlette Gomez said that the virtual sessions are both highly effective and appreciated by patients and their families.

"Thanks to Operation Smile for supporting my son in doing speech therapy online, so he can continue improving his speech,” speech therapy patient Isaias’ mother said. “Thanks to Dr. Scarlette for her support, and I hope they continue supporting us as they always have.”

Plans are currently underway to expand our virtual consultations across Latin America and the Caribbean region.

In Ethiopia, Rwanda, Ghana, Malawi, Madagascar, Honduras, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Dominican Republic and Guatemala, we’re ramping up nutritional support for patients suffering from malnutrition or food scarcity in their communities, worsened by the pandemic. These are individuals whose lives are at risk because they're unable to grow strong enough to receive surgery safely. Hundreds of cases of fortified, nutritive peanut paste, known as ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF), will be distributed to patients and families who need them.

As part of an “Extra S’Miles” campaign in Madagascar, we’re traveling across three hard-hit areas to bring patients packages of food, hygiene items and washable masks. The packages include enough food to feed a family for two to three weeks.

In India, we partnered with the Inga Health Foundation and local governments in Mumbai and Durgapur. There, we distributed food and personal hygiene items to 700 families and workers in the informal sector who are being hit the hardest by a nationwide lockdown.

Around the world, our volunteers and staff are reaching out to as many patients and their families as they possibly can. We're letting them know that once it's safe to do so, we'll be there for their cleft care needs as we were before the pandemic.

We’re committed to helping however we can in the global COVID-19 response, and we’ll remain agile to address new needs as they arise.

We're building a stronger, more prepared organization to fully meet tomorrow's essential surgical needs and care for patients and their families.

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