These doctors are using boats to bring healthcare to a remote African archipelago

  • Date: 26-May-2022
  • Source: World Economic Forum
  • Sector:Healthcare
  • Country:Middle East
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These doctors are using boats to bring healthcare to a remote African archipelago





Everyday medical emergencies can become life threatening for people who live on islands.

For the 3,000 inhabitants of Lamu County, Kenya, treatment used to be an eight-hour boat ride away.

But now a team of Safari Doctors is bringing healthcare to the people who live on the area’s 65 islands.



Umra Omar runs a very unusual medical practice, ministering to the needs of 3,000 patients living across 6,474 square kilometres and 65 islands on the north coast of Kenya. She calls her team the Safari Doctors.

The residents of Lamu County, close to the border with Somalia, have the same medical needs as people anywhere else in the world. Omar should know - this is where she grew up. The difference is, they can’t just summon an ambulance when trouble strikes.













Umra Omar: “You are as healthy and as well as a person next to you”.





Image: Safari Doctors











“If you look at a village… like Kiunga, where if you have any complication, require a C-section or anything, and you're trying to come to the main hospital, it's about an 8-hour big boat ride, or you're hiring