ISTANBUL
Turkish Red Crescent and Earth Doctors were announced to cooperate to strengthen health services in Somalia.
Turkish Red Crescent board member Sefa Saygili said Thursday that they pledged 1.35 million Turkish liras for one year to Earth Doctors that run the biggest hospital, Sifa Hospital, in Somali capital of Mogadishu.
Reminding that 11,600 people had been living in Turkish Red Crescent's camps in Mogadishu, Saygili said that the cooperation would enable them to deliver service to more people.
Secretary General of the Earth Doctors Ethem Guneren said that Red Crescent's support would be used to treat people in Red Crescent's camps free of charge and the capacity of Sifa Hospital would be doubled.
He said that 10 Somali doctors were employed at the hospital and serious surgeries were still performed by the Turkish doctors coming from Turkey time to time.
According to the protocol, signed in Istanbul, the name of the hospital would be Turkish Red Crescent Sifa Hospital.
Sifa Hospital was expected to provide health services free of charge to 300,000 patients per year.
