I. INTRODUCTION TO BRA’S HUMANITARIAN WORK BRA’s Institutional Model The Batey Relief Alliance—BRA was created in 1997 in the State of New York, United States, as a 501c3, tax-exempt, non-profit, humanitarian aid organization to address the socio-economic conditions of children and families severely affected by poverty, disease and hunger in the Caribbean. Toward that end, …
MONTE PLATA, Dominican Republic. Beautiful velones (candles), canvas bags, flower arrangements and kitchen towels are stored at BRA’s clinic in Batey Cinco Casas until their display in an open house to be held in the Monte Plata Province. These works of arts were carefully and patiently elaborated by men and women who are living with …
MONTE PLATA, Dominican Republic. Jessie Clyde, a student completing her Masters in Public Health at Columbia University’s Mailman School, spent ten weeks of her 2006 summer at Centro Medico BRA in the Batey Cinco Casas. Jessie was one of four students from Columbia who traveled to the Dominican Republic, under the Dominican Exchange Program, to …
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic. From August 11th to the 18th, Dr. Ana Celia Carrero, medical coordinator of the Centro Medico BRA, attended the Annual International HIV/AIDS conference in Toronto, Canada. Dr. Carrero joined a delegation of twenty other Dominican representatives of different organizations that work with HIV/AIDS patients in the country. It was the first …
MONTE PLATA, Dominican Republic, August 18, 2006. Early in the mornings, Centro Medico BRA at Batey Cinco Casas is bustling with sounds of busy receptionists, doctors, nurses, patients chatting and children playing. But in the last two weeks of August, a new and unusual sound was added to the environment. Only a few meters away …
SANTA Santa is 65 years old. She is not HIV positive, but has lost two daughters to AIDS. She and her husband are now the caretakers of four young granddaughters. BRA provides free medical care and support to this family and to all the families affected by the loss of family members to AIDS. Santa …
SELENA At five o’clock in the morning, Selena knocked on Susana’s door crying hysterically and begging her to purchase the bag of clothes and sheets she was carrying. The day before, she had tested positive for HIV and didn’t have any money to get to the capital for treatment. Susana brought her inside, made her …
GISELE, JEANNY, REMY, MARIE Gisele lives with her family just minutes from Batey Cojobal. Her story is like so many of BRA’s HIV/AIDS patients. Dominican-born with Haitian parents, she has spent her life in destitute poverty. She has known that she was HIV positive since she was pregnant with the fifth of her eight children, …
