A US hospital ship will visit the Dpminican Republic, Haiti and Guatemala

Tegucigalpa, Honduras
The US Navy hospital ship USNS Comfort will carry out in the last months of this year a mission of medical assistance and humanitarian attention to Honduras, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, and Haiti, informed Monday a diplomatic source in Tegucigalpa.

This will be the first trip the Comfort, built in 1987, will make since the covid-19 pandemic began in 2020, said US Ambassador to Tegucigalpa Laura Dogu.

“The United States is proud to share some of our best health care with our Honduran brothers and sisters,” she said.

She added that as all of its “collaborative activities, foreign assistance and high-level US visitors to Honduras since November of last year have demonstrated, the United States has a unique and special relationship with the Honduran people.”

The US Ambassador said she was “very proud and tremendously excited about the upcoming visit of the USNS Comfort to Honduras.”

The hospital ship’s visit, which belongs to the US Navy, to Central America, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic, is part of the fourth fleet mission called “Enduring Promise 2022,” according to a statement from the US Embassy in Honduras.

This will be Comfort’s eighth visit to Central America and the Caribbean since 2007 when it has treated more than 582,000 people and performed more than 7,000 surgeries.

Commitment to the region
In addition, it has completed more than a hundred engineering projects over the past 16 years and has conducted hundreds of subject matter expert exchanges along with other community relations projects and assistance activities, he added.

“No mission better demonstrates our enduring commitment to the region as we work in partnership with like-minded nations to ensure a secure, free and prosperous hemisphere,” said Commander, US Naval Forces Southern Command, 4th Fleet, Rear Adm. Jim Aiken.

And he stressed that “working side by side enhances the medical readiness” of the region and, at the same time, prepares them “collectively to meet regional humanitarian challenges and natural disasters.”

The hospital ship will provide general adult care, pediatrics, dental treatment, optometry, and limited surgical procedures.

It will also provide subject matter expert exchanges on various medical topics, limited veterinary care, and offer training, including humanitarian assistance and disaster first aid workshops.

As part of the mission of the USNS, one of the world’s largest floating hospitals with a dozen operating rooms and a 1,000-bed capacity, a workshop on Women, Peace and Security, a United Nations initiative that began in 2000, will be held.