Carla Bruni-Sarkozy was the guest of honor at a fundraising gala in Paris last Thursday, hosted by Hadassah France and aimed at raising money for AIDS research and treatment at Hadassah Hospital and in outreach treatment programs in Africa.
The event, which marked Hadassah France's 25th anniversary, was held under the patronage of President Nicolas Sarkozy. Other prominent guests in attendance included Director General of the Hadassah University Medical Center, Prof. Shlomo Mor-Yosef, the Israeli ambassador to Paris, and leading AIDS specialists from around the world.
"We are thrilled to have the support of Carla Bruni-Sarkozy in the global fight against AIDS," said Nancy Falchuk, National President of Hadassah, Women’s Zionist Organization of America. "Her partnership in the gala is indicative of a wider fundraising campaign for Hadassah's hospitals in Israel and the promotion of ensuring medical care for all."
Bruni-Sarkozy, a goodwill ambassador to the Global Fund to Fight Aids, visited Hadassah Hospital’s new pediatric oncology department in Israel in June 2008.
The money raised in the gala will go towards continuing the ART-JOY-LOVE Pediatrics Aids Program in Ethiopia under the auspices of the Hadassah Pediatrics AIDS Center in Jerusalem, and other Hadassah treatment and training programs in several countries in Africa.
DR. Sydney Ohana, president of Hadassah France, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Carla Bruno-Sarkozy and Israeli Ambassador to France Daniel Shek (Photo: Erez Lichtfeld)
Spearheaded by Prof. Dan Engelhard, head of the Pediatrics AIDS Center at the Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center in Ein Kerem, the Israeli-Ethiopian initiative is the first to provide life-saving anti-retroviral therapy (anti-AIDS medication) to orphans with the HIV virus in Ethiopia.
The program has resulted in a reduction in the high mortality rate in the orphanage from a 25% to 1% mortality rate per year since its inception in 2007.
Funds raised from the event will help ensure this and other programs' continued existence involving physicians, nurses, social workers, students, medical clowns and non-professionals, who volunteer to go to Ethiopia to treat and care for Ethiopian HIV/AIDS children.
The programs also include training local medical staff at Hadassah as well as on site collaboration with the Ethiopian Ministry of Health, and local orphanages.
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