Hillel Yaffe Medical Center earns "twin" status with Chinese hospital after Israeli physicians helped victims of "Great Sichuan Earthquake."
By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICHisrael china twin status_311(photo credit: (Hillel Yaffe Medical Center))
Two-and-a-half years after physicians from Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera helped victims of the “Great Sichuan Earthquake,” the Israeli hospital has earned “twin” status with a hospital in the Chinese province.The catastrophe killed almost 70,000 people, injured 375,000 and made almost 5 million people homeless.A Hillel Yaffe delegation returned from the twinning ceremony in China this week. It was headed by hospital director Prof. Meir Oren and included Dr. Morris Topaz, head of its plastic surgery department, who was in Sichuan province to treat victims in the May 2008 tragedy. Ambassador Amos Nadai and senior Chinese officials also attended the event, which was widely covered by the Chinese media.Since 2008, Topaz has continued to cooperate with the hospital in the city of Da Yang (Deyang), population around 3.8 million, which was badly hit by the tremor. The area that was damaged by the earthquake and is usually closed to foreign tourists was specially opened to the Hillel Yaffe delegation.Oren said that the cooperation created with the Chinese hospital and its director Dr. Zao Lao-Ping was natural because of the Hadera institution’s experience in treating trauma victims. “It is clear to me that the hospitals have a lot to learn from each other’s experience,” Oren said.He suggested that the cooperation agreement will lead to the involvement in China of more Hillel Yaffe medical personnel.
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