Aide Médicale Internationale in few words

Aide Médicale Internationale in few words

History and specifity of AMI

AMI is a medical, non-governmental organization created in 1979, for a long time it remained clandestine (doctors were crossing borders illegally, intervention in very moved-back zones…). For many years, its communication strategy was to work in the shadow in order to protect local populations and avoid being driven out of grounds of interventions at risks. It was born from the scission with Médecins sans Frontières, it the least know of the French doctors associations, even though chronologically it is elder than Médecins du Monde.

1. “To go where the others do not”

AMI supports extremely stripped populations which do not profit from the government assistance and which are geographically difficult to access. For example in Kurdistan, we supported populations wedged in inaccessible valleys, in Afghanistan we are present in very moved-back areas (Nouristan, Logar…). In the Democratic Republic of Congo, we develop anti-Aids programs in Kilembwe (in Kivu area), where we are the only association. We are specialists in the forgotten humanitarian crisis. So, since 1995, we have been helping the Burmese minorities from both part of the border with Thailand.

2. “Let us help them to not depend on us”

The second specificity of AMI is the local medical staff training in the zones where the health system is failing or non-existent. AMI practises little medicine of substitution, but trains local nurses, doctors, midwives and laboratory assistants with the new techniques and medical approaches. In this direction, AMI publishes magazines of continuous medical formation, always adapted to the need of the concerned country. The team’s objective is above all to contribute to the medical autonomisation of the populations, and this in the respect of their cultural identities. This is why our slogan is “let us help them to not depend on us”

3. “Priority with the ground”

The third and not the least specificity of AMI is that it dedicates the majority of its budget to its action on the ground (92% in 2004). By choice, its operating expenses are very low (7% in 2004). Its share of budget dedicated to communication is little (1% in 2004). All the teams of AMI, in Paris as well as on the ground, have the role to improve the days of the forgotten of medicine. Our team

• 15 employees in the headquarter
• 70 expatriaties on the ground
• 2 500 local collaborators
• more than 2 billions 500 000 beneficiaries accross the word. AMI’s president is Doctor Jacques BERES, cofounder of Médecins Sans Frontières, the only surgeon in Irak during the bomings. The founder and former president of AMI is Michel BONNOT, who is Doctor anaesthetist and former director of the cell of crisis of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Goals and activities AMI intervenes in emergency and post-urgency situations, and works for the re-establishment of the access to care to the population excluded from any system of health or living in conditions of extreme precariousness. Doctors, midwifes and nurses of AMI train health agents, improve the practice of obstreticians traditional, organize vaccination campaigns, equip the dispensiaries in medical material. The teams also endeavour to develop actions in the social and sanitary field (construction of latrines and well, training of teachers-hygiènistes ect...). The objective is to accompany the populations in creation or the rehabilitation by medical structures adapted to their needs.

Financial backers and partners

AMI works from institutional funds, proof of the confidence of many partners in our quality of work and our engagement. Our programs are financed by the European Union, the UNICEF, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs etc... AMI wishes to be complementary of other humanitarian associations and supports the initiatives of local associations.

Today, in order to be more autonomous and more reactive in its action, AMI hopes to be recognized and known near the general public and to reveal its history of movement founder of “non-frontièrisme”. és (CNCP). Le fondateur d’AMI est Michel Bonnot, médecin anesthésiste et ancien directeur de la cellule de crise du Ministère des Affaires étrangères.