“People talk about the Third World. We don’t live in three worlds. We live in one world.” – Paul Farmer
During his childhood, Paul Farmer and his family lived in unconventional homes including a converted school bus and a houseboat in Florida. His time in Florida also brought him into contact with Haitian people. When he first visited Haiti in 1983, he discovered huge problems in getting health care to the poorest people. While getting his medical degree from Harvard, he found his calling treating the poor and sick.
Since his medical school days he has lived and worked around the world, trying to alleviate human suffering and building a better and more just world. Known as “the man who would cure the world” he co-founded Partners in Health, an international non-profit organization that since 1987 has provided direct health care services and undertaken research and advocacy activities on behalf of those who are sick and living in poverty.
Farmer also serves as the United Nations Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Community Based Medicine and Lessons from Haiti. He is the author of “To Repair the World” and “Pathologies of Power Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor” and was the subject of Tracy Kidder’s “Mountains Beyond Mountains.”
Watch Repairing the World as Dr. Farmer talks about global health equity with Dean Nelson, founder of the Writer’s Symposium by the Sea at Point Loma Nazarene University about global health equity.