The Mae Tao Clinic (MTC), founded and directed by Dr. Cynthia Maung, provides free health care for refugees, migrant workers, and other individuals who cross the border from Burma to Thailand. People of all ethnicities and religions are welcome at the Clinic. Its origins go back to the student pro-democracy movement in Burma in 1988 and the brutal repression by the Burmese regime of that movement. The fleeing students who needed medical attention were attended in a small house in Mae Sot.Since 1989 MTC has grown, from that one small house to a large complex of simple buildings that provide a wide variety of health services to different groups of people. Today it serves a target population of approximately 150,000 on the Thai-Burma border.
Video on clinic and need for mental health services:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9ZJfTAIXo0
http://www.maetaoclinic.org/ to read more about the history of Burma and the clinic
Times news article on Burma’s political turmoil (why Ben and I first wanted to go help this cause)
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1665607,00.html
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1666576,00.html?loomia_si=t0:a16:g2:r1:c0.258438:b18559737&xid=Loomia
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1666014,00.html?iid=sphere-inline-bottom
Times news article on the tsunami
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1737748,00.html?iid=sphere-inline-bottom
