When you take out a Care Austria health insurance policy, you help people in need in the Congo. This is because we donate one percent of the total premium income incurred through our Care Austria plan (unlimited) to the Deutsche Institut für ärztliche Mission e.V. (Difäm), which provides chronically ill people in Congo with access to medical care.

Bukavu is a large city in in the eastern end of the Democratic Republic of Congo, directly on the border with Rwanda. Here, five doctors have founded the Association des Médecins de Famille du Congo (AFMC). As so-called “family physicians,” they carry out home visits for people with chronic diseases, such as diabetes or high blood pressure. With our donation, people in need in Bukavu receive access to vital medical care and medication. In the medium term, our donations will also be used to set up a form of health insurance through a personal digital health savings account to ensure that the chronically ill receive treatment and that medical staff are paid for their services and can make a living. (Image: On the street Bukavu.jpg)

Mittelfristig werden unsere Spenden auch dazu verwendet, eine Art Krankenversicherung über ein persönliches digitales Gesundheitssparbuch einzurichten, um sicherzustellen, dass die chronisch Kranken eine Behandlung bekommen und das medizinische Personal für seine Leistungen bezahlt wird und davon leben kann.

The donation made from the 2020 premium income was used to care for the following patients, among others:

Basedeke, 102 years old
Basedeke, who says he is 102 years old, has served in the army in Kinshasa all his life, most recently as a commander. Due to his age, he has high blood pressure and rheumatism. One of the family physicians comes by every day and helps him take his medication. Actually, his children should support him, but they are also too old to come by every day. The retirement funds he originally received almost never arrive anymore. Therefore his wife, who is over 90 years old, sells roasted nuts on the street. This is just enough to survive, but there is often not enough money left over for medication.

Victorina, 77 years old
Victorina suffers from high blood pressure and diabetes. She has not left her room for two years. Her children provide her with food and a bedpan. Every two weeks, one of the family physicians brings over medication if there is enough money to pay for it. Victorina is then very happy to have someone visit her. Otherwise she can only lie in bed, sometimes listening to the radio – preferably the news, because then she feels as if she is still participating in regular life.

The Deutsche Institut für ärztliche Mission e.V. (Difäm) is a not-for-profit organization that has been working to promote health in the One World (Eine Welt) for over 100 years. Its work focuses on the prevention and treatment of HIV and AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases as well as non-communicable and chronic diseases. To this end, financial support is provided, for example, to local health facilities such as the AFMC.