Promoting Health and Human Rights "With Those Who Have No Voice" Box 1761,
Board of Directors President (CEO) First Vice-President Second Vice-President Chairperson Financial Chairperson Treasurer (CFO) Secretary Registrar Volunteer Coordinator Human Rights Counsel Medical Ethics Counsel Public Health Counsel Public Relations Counsel Linnea Capps, MD, MPH DGH Profile: DGH Reporter is edited & designed by Monica Sanchez. You can e-mail your comments, suggestions and article ideas, or mail them to: P.O. Box 20111, London Terrace Station, New York, NY 10011. DGH is administered by a volunteer Board of Directors whose members have volunteered with DGH a minimum of three years and are elected by DGH Voting Members. The Board is assisted by an Advisory Council composed of nearly 100 physicians, students, retirees, artists, nurses, business people and others. A diverse group of volunteers provides the vital core of DGH’s resources, including this newsletter and web site. There are no paid employees. DGH is incorporated in the state of Georgia as a 501(c)3 organization. All donations are tax deductible. |
His given name is Clyde Lanford Smith, but his friends, co-workers, students, patients, even his acquaintances, would not recognize him by that name. To the world he is just "Lanny." That simple fact reveals the essence of the man who, at 36 years of age, has already helped improve the lives of over 40,000 people in southeastern El Salvador and been the driving force behind the founding of DGH. He is an intelligent, talented physician, dedicated to fighting for the health and human rights of those less fortunate, who has accomplished what many warned him was impossible; and he has done it with humility, a warm smile, a contagious sense of humor and a genuine interest in everyone who crosses his path. "I met Lanny when I was training to be a health promoter. We were discussing women’s rights and machismo and he made a joke and I knew right away he was a good person and I would like working with him," recalls Etelvina Umana, a native of El Rodeo, who joined the project in 1996, "He has been a good example to us all. He knows how to share with others. He always wants us to feel equal to him and share with others what we know and learn."
Lanny grew up in a loving suburban home in Atlanta, Georgia, the oldest of three boys. His parents, Clyde and Renée Smith, influenced the path he has chosen. "My concern with community as a whole started when I was little," he explains, "My parents worked with kids in the poor section of town, mostly black kids, and I didn’t understand why they did it. Sometimes I even resented them for doing it. But looking back, that’s a memory that has touched me as something very important in my life." The Smiths also stood up for their strong belief in the equal rights of all human beings. "My dad always fought for people, like women in his office who were being discriminated against," Lanny remembers with pride. An avid reader since he first learned his ABCs, Lanny wanted to study English Literature and become a writer. Upon graduating from high school, he entered Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina. His other love, the great outdoors, led him to join the long-distance track team, frequently competing in the 10K race—a physical stamina that would serve him well as he routinely worked 20-hours a day, seven days a week in El Salvador. In recognition of such hard work, Lanny was honored by his alma mater this year, which presented him with the John Kuykendall Award for Community Service. It was this desire to serve the community that made him question his career path. Between his sophomore and junior year, Lanny says he realized that though he loved literature, he needed a more concrete way to help people. Becoming a doctor seemed the best way to fulfill both his goals. "I thought I could make a good doctor and that being able to listen to people’s stories would be good training as a writer too," admits Lanny, "What I didn’t count on was liking being a doctor as much as I do. It was a very nice surprise."
He graduated with a major in English Literature in 1985 and was set to start at the Medical College of Georgia in the Fall, when he decided to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity building houses in Nicaragua for the Summer. That eye-opening experience changed the course of his life. "I lived with a campesino family and started seeing that there are people in the world who have really terrible, terrible lives. The family I lived with had no running water. There was a well in the middle of the corral, and rain water (with excrement) ran into it, and then we drank that water everyday. There was no latrine. People were just terribly poor and yet struggling to make their lives better. That’s when I decided that I wanted to work with people who didn’t have the opportunities I did and yet had a desire to improve their own lives." While he completed his medical training, Lanny continued to visit Nicaragua, which he has come to think of as his second birth place. After medical school he moved to Boston to do his internship and residency at Boston City Hospital, a non-profit, public hospital, serving Boston’s poorer South End. There his interest in international medicine found many outlets, all of which paved the way to El Salvador. In 1992, Lanny was in his last year of training in Internal Medicine, working as Senior Resident at Boston City Hospital. He had applied and been accepted to the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), but was torn about his next step, "I thought I would get more out of Public Health School if I worked abroad for a year. Dr. Jonathan Mann, who was at Harvard then, suggested I consider working for a year with MDM and offered to write me a recommendation." Earlier that year, the Peace Accords were signed in El Salvador. Lanny learned MDM had a project there, which they were planning to dismantle by the end of the year, and thought it would be wonderful to bring the groups that had just recently been at war with each other together under the common goal of promoting health. "I made an exploratory trip to El Salvador in July of 1992 to find out if the Health as Reconciliation project I had in mind seemed reasonable," explains Lanny, "The three MDM International Volunteers living in El Salvador agreed it did and the more than twenty other institutions I spoke with concurred. The site I decided on—isolated, war-torn and minimally organized Morazán—was new to the MDM Volunteers, but that did not deter them. They agreed to have their last project serve as a bridge for the community-based initiative I wanted to implement." In October of 1992—having worked-out credit for his year abroad as an Affiliate Student at HSPH under Dr. Mann, as well as getting a practicum year credit for a Preventive Medicine Residency and a Community Oriented Primary Care Fellowship at the Center for Community Responsive Care—he moved to El Salvador and began training Health Promoters with the MDM Volunteers.
One of the things that surprised Lanny most upon his arrival was how open the Salvadoran people were to a ‘Gringo.’ He had feared that after suffering through a 12-year civil war largely financed by US military aid, they would be resistant to him. "They seemed to understand that the policies of a government do not necessarily reflect the feelings of its people. After all, theirs certainly didn’t reflect their own," marvels Lanny, who at 6-feet, with light blond-hair and a very fair complexion, had little chance of just blending in. If the project was going to succeed, Lanny had to build on that openness and create trust and enthusiasm among the communities. He immediately met with members of ADECOSAL, a community development association formed by many of the villages in Morazán, the area where he wanted to work. "I went with each of them into their home community. Being invited and accompanied by someone from there gave me a certain legitimacy," explains Lanny, "I told them that I had been invited to explore a health project for MDM and wanted to know what they would like to see in it. One thing that I made very clear was that I had no funding. I was there to help them come up with ideas and after that I would help look for money, but that didn’t mean we would ever get money." Maria Isabel Martinez, a Mental Health Promoter who teaches in the project’s Center for Integral Child Development (CIDI) of La Presa, remembers this well, "He came and held a meeting to see the things that were needed by the community. We decided that they were health care and education. We had nobody to guide us in our work and he seemed like a good guide because he had good ideas. Lanny never promised anything, but rather encouraged our ideas. He always came without anything, just with his body and soul and his words and decisions and richness in genuine desire to help. Once we started acting on our ideas he was behind us all the way." Following up with the money was harder than Lanny had anticipated: "The biggest challenge was just to put together sufficient financial resources to do some semblance of what the people in the communities had prioritized." MDM-France came through with some minimal backing and promised to take the project before the European Union (EU) for funding, but the process was drawn out and full of pit falls. "About one year into the project it became clear that EU funding wasn’t going to come overnight. It was also clear that people trusted me, both in Morazán and in MDM-France, as well as in other potential funding sources," he says, explaining his decision to stay one more year, which eventually turned into five more, "I just basically realized that it wouldn’t be right for me to leave El Salvador and the project until I felt it had sufficient funding and sufficient resources in terms of people to keep things going."
Lanny has no intention of sounding like a martyr, however. "It may sound like a sacrifice to people, but really it’s a great privilege," he asserts, "I was quite clear that I was in the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing and, to top it all off, I was having fun doing it." He emphasizes that every day was filled with moments that reinforced this conviction, like the laughter evoked by the plays put on by the health promoters to educate the communities about important health topics. "Men, who just a few years before had been soldiers in the FMLN, would dress up as women to promote the importance of breast milk. It was hilarious and people in the village were just very, very appreciative," recalls Lanny with a smile. After more than six years of accompanying the people of Morazán, Lanny left El Salvador this past December. "In community work, knowing when to leave becomes a key part of the process. If one leaves too early, then the work will fall apart because one did not prepare others sufficiently to continue. If one stays too long, then the others, who were once ready to take over, have left instead in frustration, or have never been encouraged to take control," he explains. Lanny’s immediate plans include a year of academic study. MDM awarded him a scholarship to attend the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine from January to April of this year, where he received a Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, and in September he will finally be going back for his Masters in Public Health at Harvard. "During that time I will evaluate where the best place is for me to act in the future," declares Lanny, "Since some of the most obvious human suffering in the world (in terms of preventable disease) occurs in Africa, I am leaning toward working in a community there. With that in mind, over the Summer I will be visiting Uganda for a short time to teach in a medical school and then taking an intensive French course in France before starting school in the Fall." As the Volunteer president of DGH, Lanny also plans to work with the other DGH Volunteers to continue supporting the work in El Salvador, Chiapas, Honduras and Peru, as well as helping the organization grow and become sustainable without depending on any one person. "I intend to be very involved until there is human dignity and social justice for persons all around the world," assures Lanny. Bustling plans for the future aside, leaving El Salvador has been difficult for Lanny. "Personally I’m sad because I’ve grown to love being in El Salvador, living with the people there, and it is very tough knowing that is not a daily part of my life anymore," he admits, "But I also have a lot to be happy about: the work is going to continue, the Salvadoran people whom I have worked with for years have taken charge through MDS, and there are three more years of assured funding and a lot of commitment by the people in the communities." (MDS was DGH's partner organization in El Salvador between 1995 and 2004.)
In addition to seeing a bright future for the project in El Salvador, Lanny is pleased to be able to look back on all that they have accomplished over the years. Two CIDIs have been built as well as a clinic, a pharmacy and the bridge over the Rio Chiquito. Health Promoters, some of whom never attended a year of school in their lives, have all gone through grade school equivalency and are finishing high school. Some of them have even started college. And many student volunteers from El Salvador, the US and other countries, have had their vision changed about what their role is in the world. "I think we also helped reinforce hope within a lot of people in these communities," adds Lanny, "Made them feel there are people who think about them, who care about them and, in some ways, inspired them to care about their own lives. I’ve been incredibly privileged in my time there to work with an incredible people. People who have taught me a lot about suffering and not complaining; about having a positive attitude even when your family has been killed; about not giving up." Those same people feel just as strongly about him. Eulalia Perez, one of the health promoters says, "Lanny has been a true friend of the community. He is a good person who lived in solidarity with us." Ms. Martinez concurs, "He is a true friend. We have a lot of trust in him. The way he behaves is just like a Salvadoran. We see him as one of us here in the campo, which is not always easy to achieve. Lanny’s work touched everything here, down to the smallest grain of sand."
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DGH
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