As a member of the Balgowlah Heights community, Dr. Tony McMullen is a good friend of mine and someone who has been an important part of this area. His work as a local GP in Balgowlah Village is well respected, but so too is his humanitarian work. For nearly 12 years he has been working in Indonesia, offering support for local communities there.
In this video, I sit down with Dr. Tony and discuss the work his organization, the Persada Children’s Health Foundation, has been doing in in West Papua in Indonesia since 2005. The goal of that organization is to provide health programs, support giving kids in the region operations they may not have access to or cannot afford, and address ongoing malaria issues in the area.
Because these direct interventions for the children and their families in West Papua, the organization works to increase the local capacity of the healthcare system in the area through training and nutritional programs. Community based rehabilitation is a big part of the efforts locally as well as interaction between the children in Papua and those outside the area. In recent years, Tony say there has been a shift toward business activities with a social agenda – trying to turn business activities into good change in the area.
Dr. Tony has been a world traveler for most of his professional career, spending much of the last 22 years in places like Africa, Ireland, Paris, Vietnam, and of course Indonesia. It is that time overseas that has allowed him to become a patron of such an important organization and his office shows what he has been able to gather in the course of his travels.
You can learn more about the Persada Children’s Health Foundation on the organization’s Facebook Page or on their official website here.