Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder
As a typical American reading this book, it is extremely difficult to envision just how incredible Dr. Paul Farmer's accomplishments are. Simply traveling to and existing in the places where he has done incredible work is far beyond the will or the desire of the vast majority of us. The fact that he entrenches himself in places where others would much rather turn a blind eye is a direct challenge to all of us who wish to pretend that our world does not contain the kind of daily suffering that is beyond our reasonable imagination.
Without a doubt, Mountains Beyond Mountains captures the imagination of its readers. It does so because of the strength and seemingly limitless perseverance of the story's central character, Dr. Paul Farmer. The book follows Dr. Farmer's mission to create a modern health care facility in Haiti as his efforts eventually spread across the globe through the organization he started and the inspiring people who work with him. Throughout the book, there are numerous examples of dedicated medical and policy professionals providing legitimate health care services for the poorest regions of the world. The most impressive thing about their accomplishments is just how difficult it is to make anything happen when the majority of those controlling wealth believe that such efforts are simply not worth it.
How does a grassroots organization fight drug-resistant tuberculosis in the poorest areas of Peru when local authorities AND the World Health Organization believe that it is not possible to do so? That's the magic of Dr. Paul Farmer and Partners in Health, the organization that he started that is dedicated to providing quality and intelligent health care to the most destitute areas of the planet.
When one ponders the far-off lands where genocide, civil war and uncontrollable disease are the norm, we rarely get beyond the images that we see on the evening news. To understand the social and political intricacies underlying these areas of the world and then to navigate them to bring about near-miraculous achievements in health care is most certainly beyond us.
Yet we read in detail about just how Dr. Farmer and his colleagues trudged through insurmountable obstacles and how they continue to do so, on a daily basis. Mountains Beyond Mountains is not necessarily a feel-good story. It is about an enormous and ongoing struggle that may never be fully won - a struggle that often requires at least a step backwards for every few steps forward. But the victory is in the refusal to quit and the ability to make things happen in places where others would not even dare to try.
In the poorest parts of the world, countless people die every day of diseases that have been eradicated or can be easily treated in the developed world. Yet, because of the cost of medicine and treatment relative to the economic conditions of these poor regions, even the most benevolent organizations often calculate that it is not cost-effective to try to treat people with the best available medicines and medical technology.
To read this book is to be directly challenged and inspired, but it will almost certainly not be enough to move the vast majority of us to meaningful action - and most definitely not in Haiti or some other down-trodden corner of the globe. Our worlds and our current existence are far too comfortable to risk trying to do the things that the people in the book have achieved. Instead, perhaps, we can find enough inspiration in the book to tackle the areas of our personal lives where we can bring about a better existence for the people around us.
