A young Syrian orphan with his new prosthetic legs in 2017.
Doha: The World Innovation Summit for Health (WISH), an initiative of Qatar Foundation (QF), is curating a photographic exhibition at the Education City Student Center that explores the complex health issues faced by communities living in perilous conditions due to conflict, and the work by healthcare professionals to help them.
The exhibition, titled ‘Healthcare in Conflict Settings: Mitigating Suffering, Offering Hope’, will run until April 30, with free entry.
A preview event will take place today from 5pm, which will be attended by Dr Mukesh Kapila, WISH Forum Chair and Professor of Global Health and Humanitarian Affairs at the University of Manchester, and exhibiting photographer Showkat Shafi, whose photographs for Al Jazeera of the plight of Rohingya fleeing Myanmar feature in the exhibition.
The exhibition showcases the work of eight photographers working with organisations such as Qatar Red Crescent, Orbis, Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) and Al Jazeera. Among the conflict settings featured are Syria, Yemen, Palestine, and Bangladesh.
Kuwaiti photographer Abdulrahman Al Terkait, who has contributed photos of the rehabilitation of amputee children in Syria to the WISH exhibition, said: “Through my pictures I try to convey the challenges faced, but also the positivity of the children I feature. I’m honoured to have been included in a photographic exhibition that explores such an important and emotive subject.”
WISH recently announced that healthcare in conflict settings is to be one of the core topics featured at WISH 2018, which takes place in Doha on November 13-14. A report will be produced ahead of the summit, and an event that brought experts together to discuss the problems faced when delivering healthcare in conflict zones was held earlier this month at the University of Oxford.
