When I met Nela Hasic - director of the regional program of empowerment of women health (WHEP) in Bosnia and Herzegovina - it was immediate...
When I met Nela Hasic - director of the regional program of empowerment of women health (WHEP) in Bosnia and Herzegovina - it was immediately clear that he had met someone special.
In 1992, after the collapse of Yugoslavia, the Bosnian capital Sarajevo - the house Nela - he came under siege. She received an American Board of Appeal Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC). "JDC aviation members of the security of the Bosnian community," he said. "You have to be at the airport in half an hour."
Nela said she was reluctant to be told that the war would soon pass through the city, but his father (a Holocaust survivor) said: "For once in my life, I experienced a similar situation, we thought that everything will be fine. would that nothing would happen -. Then finally alone in the world "
So his two young children (5 and 3) taken two sets of pajamas, a coat and purse and left. After six months in Belgrade and Budapest, as refugees live with their children, Nela closes again with her husband, and soon after went to Israel and "immigrant status" (which was rescued by other convoys JDC). to build a new life in Israel, Nela and her family for a decade decided at his home in Bosnia return. But because so many tragedies, it was not the house she remembered.
His future in his "new" home was unsafe ... until Nela was asked by the Joint Disciplinary Committee to conduct WHEP - a program that encourages the early detection of breast cancer, to create groups of support and telephone lines and facilitating partnerships in the community , The WHEP was originally created by the Joint Disciplinary Committee in 1995, and Susan G. Komen was founded in 2005 as a partner in this pioneering work.
Employee travel Nela pain, promise and hope has been in the country has become an effective leader for women's health. His passion and determination were clear when I had the opportunity to see this work first hand during my first visit to Bosnia last month.
I knew the history of rending countries that still divided parts of the population leaves - some by accident, some by choice.
But most were familiar the obstacles they had to overcome, as he worked to fight against breast cancer. I found the JDC leaders reported that when the WHEP was founded in 1995, there is no breast cancer awareness in Bosnia was. In fact, perceive how people had the disease on the reality similar to that we face in the United States when our organization was founded in 1982 - a cloak of shame, stigma and misinformation.
And so, as we had to change was needed the conversation in the United States, the change in Bosnia. Fortunately, we have to persuade a brave, determined and of the woman on the head.
Nela and our partners around the WHEP and JDC have worked from the beginning to serve a national organization to build women, surpassing all obstacles. It started with another lawyer, and now joins 23 women's organizations in the region. "We did not give the word religion or other differences," the Times of Israel said. "Women's health is our program."
Displaying images of the first race of Bosnia for the Cure in 2008, and there on the race last year comparison shows the Nela and JDC led transformation better than words can (believe me not, to witness Bosnia, Serbia or Croatia the power of this work) to mention. In just 7 years, our participants more than doubled Race, 2400 7,000 participants over.
During my visit, several times I found myself in awe of friendship and harmony WHEP Nela and women could promote all faiths and backgrounds. I was only there for (animated) 40 hours but I felt like I had made friends for life.
I had the opportunity to visit a village where a group of women in the mosque gathered a doctor about what a mammogram to hear. After we met in a clinic when a WHEP OB / GYN and a mobile mammography unit to provide health services for women. asked technicians on the screen 50 women available, but could be seen 60 (90 percent of these women, it was their first mammogram)!
I was present with a group of survivors who meet regularly in Sarajevo to create Herzkissen for women in breast cancer management - really tried a gift from the heart of the women who only support each other.
Thanks to the way this club has transformed the health of women through Bosnia, others try to learn from Nela and WHEP. During my time in Bosnia, we were accompanied by the most unlikely partners - Israeli and Palestinian women - who are jointly addressed to the Management WHEP how to help women with breast cancer in their own communities.
This is the power of association - goals and determination.
Nela would be the first to say, but be, this is not an easy task. There is direct access from A to Z. It is rather a journey ... from A to C and so on to B.
The key to bringing mutually reinforcing women.
