Exactly eighteen years after the inauguration of the first project realized by our association in the Philippines, the  Vittorino Carra Learning Center in Cogeo (inaugurated on January 4th 1992), on January 4th 2010 we have inaugurated in Manaoag (Philippines) the St. Camillus Maternity Center and Polyclinic - Vittorino Carra Building.

Opening this hospital in a very important event for the population of the area, that don't have at the moment any adequate structure to face the extremely high children death rate of those places.

The ceremony has been attended by the Archbishop Socrates Buenaventura Villegas, the Hon. Amado Espino - Governor of the Pangasinan Provence, the Major Napoleon Sales, the authorities of the area, Father Luigi Galvani - founder of the  Camillian Lay Association of the Philippines, all Manaoag members of the Camillian Lay Association, and, on behalf of our association, Riccardo, Marzia and Francesco Carra.

The Mass has been celebrated by the Archbishop Villegas, that after has blessed all the rooms of the new hospital.

Our representatives, together with the Governor and the Major, have cut the ribbon.

All the children of the schools part of the Camillian Center have participated the ceremony and have been performing dancing and singing.

The wonderful ceremony has been concluded with thanksgiving speeches to our association and a speech from Riccardo Carra, who went through the steps of our solidarity path that led us to complete this further, outstanding construction. Riccardo mentioned that this "miracle" has been made possible thanks to the generosity of our supporters.

The new hospital will start to operate already at the beginning of February, at the beginning limited to some functions as the selection of medical and paramedic personnel is still ongoing and the medical equipment installation is ongoing as well. Important to note, the x-ray equipment, extremely important for such an hospital, has already been installed.

Our association, besides financing the building, has collected medical equipment donated by some Italian hospitals: San Pio X (Milan), Negrar (Verona), Modena, Sassuolo and Pavullo. All those equipment, together with all the ceramic tiles donated by our supporter which have paved all the new hospital, have been already sent to Manaoag in six (!) containers. Further medical equipment have been bought in the Philippines and will be delivered over the next weeks. Nevertheless, to completely equip the hospital, important elements are still missing, like for example an ultrasound equipment and an ambulance. This is way we plan to continue to raise funds during 2010, to be able to make the hospital fully operational and efficient.

More pictures of the celebration are available in this site in the section Gallery then clicking "Ospedale di Manaoag - Filippine" then "Inaugurazione 4 Gennaio 2010".

We have also made a short video, actually split in two videos given the 10 minutes YouTube limitation. The links to the two videos are at the top of the left bar in this page.