Project Peds: Sri Lanka Tsunami Relief

March 22, 2007: GROUND BROKEN FOR WORLD CHILDREN'S INITIATIVE'S PEDIATRIC FACILITY AT MATARA

$ 400,000 Donation From Bush Clinton Tsunami Fund Facilitates Progress For WCI's Project Peds

On January 16, 2007, the then Sri Lankan Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera, formally initiated ground breaking at the site where Project Peds' 100-bed Matara Pediatric Facility (MPF) will soon stand. Hundreds of Matara residents thronged to the ceremony to see where their children and grandchildren will receive high quality medical attention for generations to come.

Mr. Chaminda Wijetilleke and Mr. Lionel Jayaratne attended the ground-breaking ceremony on behalf of Project Peds. "When you walk on the land [where our pediatric hospital will be] and you see hundreds of people in attendance for the ceremony and then see the granite foundation with "World Children's Initiative" on it, it's a pretty incredible feeling to see our project becoming tangible," Mr. Wijetilleke remarked. "We would not have been able to get this far without support from the dozens of donors – big and small – and dedicated volunteers who have sacrificed so much to advance our project. I keep thinking about the support we've received from President Bush and President Clinton's Tsunami Foundation; their huge donation has given us the capital and credibility to play a prominent role in revitalizing pediatric healthcare in Sri Lanka" Mr. Wijetilleke added.

(Pictured From Left to Right: Shani Pereira, Lionel Jayaratne (Project Peds’ Project Manager, SL), Chaminda Wijetilleke (Project Peds Steering Committee Member), Navein Pereira (Project Peds Coordinator (SL), Dr Eshara Perera (Ministry of Health), Suchit Mohdi (Project Peds Architect)

Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera (foreground) delivers a speech at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Korea-Sri Lanka Friendship Hospital, Matara Sri Lanka

Project Peds is led by two leading American children's hospitals, Children's National Medical Center (CNMC) and Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh (CHP), and the World Children's Initiative (WCI), a new non-profit comprised of volunteers from diverse racial, professional and personal backgrounds. The Project Peds Steering Committee is multi-ethnic, with organizers of both Tamil and Sinhalese ancestry, who have reached across the frontlines of a bloody civil war to collaborate in the interest of children's healthcare.

The Matara Pediatric Facility (MPF) will not stand in isolation. Partly because of the attention WCI focused on rehabilitating pediatric healthcare in southern Sri Lanka, the Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) has engaged the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) to finance and build an adult medical complex, the Korea-Sri Lanka Friendship Hospital, to complement MPF.

Foundation Tablet, Korea-Sri Lanka Friendship Hospital, Matara Sri Lanka

Breaking-ground at the MPF site is both the culmination of and metaphor for what Project Peds has achieved on so many fronts in the past year.

Staffing: After an exhaustive search, Project Peds has assembled a professional, highly qualified, new team dedicated to developing WCI as well as implementing the programs of Project Peds. This team includes an experienced Managing Director based out of the United States and an in-country, Sri Lankan Project Manager who has worked with U.S. AID on development projects for more than 15 years. Additionally, two American pediatricians with significant academic and public health policy backgrounds have agreed to travel to Sri Lanka to establish a patient database, conduct an updated needs assessment and develop related clinical guidelines and teaching curricula. Read more about our new staff

Fundraising: On the fundraising front, Project Peds has had enormous success. Project Peds has raised more than $ 600,000 of the estimated $2 million cost of the new pediatric hospital. The sources of these funds are many and varied. The Bush Clinton Tsunami Foundation donated $ 400,000. CHP, the Carnegie foundation and Kaiser Permanente donated nearly $100,000. In a demonstration of the significant support that WCI enjoys in the Sri Lankan American community and the broader South Asian American community, WCI has raised $ 60,000 from community fundraisers and yet another $ 60,000 has been donated by doctors who attended the 2006 Sri Lankan American Medical Association of North America (SLMANA) Conference.

The recent donations put Project Peds well ahead of their original funding schedule. Project Peds now has sufficient funds to construct and equip most of MPF. However, Project Peds still needs to fill a $ 1 million funding gap to provide critical care equipment, supplies and medications to the ward. Project Peds' fundraising efforts continue. Your support is critical to our work and important goal of raising the standard of children's healthcare in southern Sri Lanka..

To donate, please go to How to Donate and follow the instructions.

Next Steps: Project Peds will continue to seek funding from a number of donors of all scales. It currently has proposals pending before Americares and the American Red Cross; Project Peds is confident that it will soon have all the funding that it needs to fully develop MPF.

On the project execution front, Project Peds will continue to work with KOICA to construct MPF and integrate it into the Sri Lanka-Korean Friendship Hospital. Project Peds will strengthen its Memorandum of Understanding with the Sri Lankan Government, through amendments and other instruments, to ensure that the GOSL maintains its commitment to sustain funding, provide staff and otherwise maintain MPF for the long term.

Recognizing that local support is critical to the long term success of MPF, Project Peds' project management team in Sri Lanka will continue to secure support from community leaders in Colombo and Matara and give them a strong stake in the success of MPF.

For more information, please visit www.slprojectpeds.org.

For general information or inquiries regarding Project Peds, please write to: projectpeds@gmail.com or email@slprojectpeds.org. For media or press information, please contact Mr. P. Gulasekaram by email or by telephone at 212.998.6384.

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PRESIDENTS BUSH AND CLINTON GIVE MAJOR BOOST TO PROJECT PEDS WITH A $400,000 DONATION

March 2006 (Washington, DC): Presidents George H.W. Bush and William J. Clinton have accelerated Project Peds’ efforts to resurrect Matara General Hospital’s (MGH’s) pediatrics ward, which is located in a tsunami-affected area of Sri Lanka, by donating $400,000 from the Bush-Clinton Houston Tsunami Fund. The donation, which is the largest single donation to Project Peds to date, will be used to construct and fully equip the General Pediatrics Floor of the ward. The donation is also a strong endorsement from two distinguished presidents who have learned how to identify successful development NGOs both through their work in the White House and through their year of hands-on tsunami fundraising at the request of President George W. Bush.

The Sri Lanka Project Peds Team pauses for a group photo with Former Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton during a working session in New Orleans.

Former Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton film a public service announcement encouraging the American people to make cash donations to the tsunami relief effort on January 5, 2005 (www.whitehouse.gov).