One of the things which I firmly believe, is that spending time in the company of intelligent people allows your natural intelligence to develop more than if you spend time with less intelligent people. Now we have the medical elective students out with us, and a Social Policy graduate, I'm starting to feel like I'm pretty much the bottom of the academic pile - which is true.

Today they had a little off-hand discussion about International Development in terms of improving the conditions of the poor people we're working for. Although the Dr's may have the skills to do things at the 'one child at a time' level that we operate, they can't help be put off by the bigger picture. Corrupt governments and the need for the health sector to be 'commercialised' so that some fat cats can make a load of money.

Seeing the difference that medics can make at a local level shows the need for trained medics to go into places as smaller teams and individuals. If change can't happen through a top-down approach, then individuals need to take the responsibility to make it happen from a bottom-up one. Either that or the NHS has to expand to the IHS.

Many Doctors from less well off may migrate to the UK, but there needs to be a way for them to compensate their local community for the lack of medical skill, rather than just the financial compensation that the community gets from the Doctor sending back a % of their paycheck each month.

It's great to hear people of my own age thinking through these problems and actually coming out here to do something about it, and investigate the problems more. Given that so many people are currently traveling around the world due to the poor economic climate, the awareness of these peoples' struggles is increased. Let's try and do something about it.. together.