Hello everyone! Very sorry for the huge gap between this and the last post. Now that it is summer, I plan to post on a more frequent schedule and expand on public health! Recently, I went to Africa to help and support a humanitarian mission with one of my friend’s relatives. The program’s goal was to help deliver free eyecare for one of the schools by offering free eye exams and consultations, as well as free glasses. I was only there for the initial launch of the program, but it was very interesting and impactful! I am sure the mission will succeed and will continue to grow. In this post I would like to discuss healthcare access in the regions I visited. I mainly stayed in Accra with my friend’s family. It was one of the more fortunate areas I visited with frequent clinics and doctors’ offices. There were also a lot of schools and many billboards promoting education. However, there still were some areas, like the markets, where I could tell it was a lower income region and many people had visible health issues such as untended injuries that healed wrong over time that could have been fixed if they were able to see a doctor. Towards the end of our trip, my family took a guided tour to Cape Coast, another place in Ghana roughly three hours away from Accra. The drive there gave me a whole new perspective. Until that point, I had been staying in the wealthier part of Africa, but as I looked out the window, I was exposed to new environments. I saw little to no healthcare access, and many kids not in school during the weekday. Everyone’s house seemed to be built out of scrap metal or sticks and mud. I was expecting to see impoverished areas, but not to the this extent. It was honestly quite upsetting to see this. I would like to help out more; I plan to be a more active member within my friend’s relatives program next year and hopefully start my own passion project this summer. I would also like to expand once I am in medical school to other areas outside of the U.S., such as Russia to help teach English to students. Some other cultural differences I noticed were the food. It consisted of a LOT more vegetables and they didn’t have a lot of sweet things. Even food that was meant to be sweet such as ice cream or chocolate was noticeably way less sweetened than U.S. products or other places I’ve been. This factor probably contributes to the fact that I also didn’t notice anyone overweight or obese and everyone had very healthy, white teeth. Overall, this trip was very impactful and eye-opening. I would love to visit again and help with the humanitarian mission more next time, the African culture is absolutely beautiful, and I liked it a lot. Consider visiting! (Just prepare for the VERY challenging task of getting a visa…) Remember to volunteer and help your community as much as possible and see you next time!