On June 24, Prof. Yoram Weiss, director of Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem, and Hadassah International Latin American Project Manager Jeanne Vachon-Flores met with a delegation from Honduras, led by its president, Juan Orlando Hernández.
The visit was an outgrowth of several initiatives earlier this year: the creation of the Hadassah Health Latin American (LATAM) Ambassadors Forum, facilitated by Hadassah International; the May Hadassah Medical Organization’s humanitarian mission to Argentina; as well as the zoom meeting between Hadassah Ein Kerem staff and representatives of the LATAM health ministries. The Argentinian mission’s goal was to share experiences in treating COVID-19 and to discuss the potential of initiating a clinical trial in Argentina of the COVID-19 vaccine developed in Israel. The zoom meeting focused also on the pandemic.
President Hernández had traveled to Israel to inaugurate the Honduran Embassy in Jerusalem and to consolidate ties and cooperative ventures between Honduras and Israel. Israel’s Ministry of Health and the Government of Honduras had invited the representatives of HMO and Hadassah International to meet with the Honduran delegation. Prof. Weiss was asked to give a presentation about Israel and Hadassah’s experience with the COVID-19 pandemic.
During the meeting, the participants also discussed the possibility of Honduran physicians doing their residencies at Hadassah, as well as the options for sharing Hadassah medical experiences with medical institutions in Honduras. Plans are to develop these partnerships further in the coming months.