The Louis Marchesi Clinic was an intivative to create a health care service in Lebanon. The promotional material published by Round Table Lebanon described it as the following:
— Louis Marchesi Clinic is an independent, non profitable medical relief program with a deep concern for Community service. Louis Marchesi’s philosophy is that those who are capable of helping others should actively assist those who lack the basic elements of health, food and education.
— Location: In a popular area of the city of Beirut — Lebanon.
— Aims: A community service program; being a free dispensary for poor people who cannot afford private clinic expenses.
— Land cost and Architect fees are offered free by R.T. Lebanon for the construction of a medical center before 1978 the 50th Anniversary of Round Table.
— Twelve Doctors, six of them Tablers, will ensure 8 hours a day service, six days a week.
— Nurses and other team members receive small salaries.
— Doctors offer services FREE OF CHARGES.
As part of the Brotherhood Programm campaign, the association requested a number of items, including Examinations Tables, X Ray Units, Centrifuges, Refrigerators, EKG Machines, Instruments and various equipment. Moreover, they requested cash donations, which would have had the following impacts:
$12,500 provides financial support for the total project, medical and administrative expenses.
$3,000 provides administrative expenses for one year.
$200 provides financial support for medical treatment for one month.
$100 provides basic medical care for an entire village for 15 days.
$50 provides daily medical treatment for tuberculosis for one person for three months.
$25 provides two months of medicine and food necessary to overcome malnutrition in a child.
$10 provides half unit of blood for a child with leukemia.
$5 provides five days of treatment for severe fungus disease in a child.
$1 provides necessary food for a family for one day.
No information on this intiative could be found online, so the current status is unknown. From the RT Digital Archiving Initiative, we found correspondance between WOCO, Kinsmen, and RT Lebanon. In 1974, it was decided that these organisations would support the initiative, with substantial donations. In 1975, Lebabon experienced a sequence of violence and massacres, which led to invasions and civil wars. Correspondace we have from 1975–1979 show concern for the Lebanese Round Tablers, and for the substantial donations.
In a letter dated January 4, 1979, Roger Saygh wrote that:
For your information, in July 1978, the local facility for the clinic was bombed; and as we are still in a critical situation, we are unable to meet among members to take any decision about the clinic.
As for the money, we can assure you that it is still in The Royal Bank of Canada
On March 29, 1979, Pete Hanly on behalf of Kinsmen Clubs wrote
…I have now been instructed to formally ask you to return the funds to us to be held in trust here in Canada here in Canada for you. The funds will only be held until such time as they are required by your organization, whereupon we would make the full amount of the funds plus interest accrued available to you.
The only thing that we would ask at that time is some positive assurance that the clinic was in fact going to be built and properly staffed. In the event that the clinic is unable to be built or in the unlikely event that your organization disbands, we would then have to return to our members, who donated the funds, to see where they should be placed. Every consideration would be given at that time to proposals from your area of the world.
Looking forward to hearing from you concerning the above.
Sincerely yours in World Council,
No further updates have yet been traced. The Civil war was formally over ten years later in 1990.
Written by Christopher Mintoff
Sources: RT Digital Archiving Initiative