Private Touring
to the
Most Intriguing Place
on Earth

My Visit to The Brooke Clinic in Aswan. 
  by Joyce Carta

April 2008

2008 marks the 20^th year that The Brooke has been treating the donkey, horse and mule population in Upper Egypt, as well as spreading needed information on care and nutrition to the people whose lives depend on these animals. The Brooke is a worldwide organization with now six clinic locations in Egypt. The clinics are home base for a large network of mobile veterinary units that bring care directly to the animals where they live and work. I'd wanted to visit The Brooke Clinic in Aswan for a long time but never, until this last trip to Egypt, had time to schedule a visit. My business, Egypt Magic, is a tour company and I design custom, private Egypt tours and visit Egypt at least once a year. My April 08 trip allowed an entire morning to spend touring The Brooke Clinic.

I prepared for the visit the night before buying a kilo of carrots in Aswan's market, as we all know that there's no way faster to a donkey's heart. And since one of my goals was mane hair pulling for Dr. Phil Sponenberg's color genetics project, a reward for the participants was definitely in order.

As just a bit of background...Egyptian civilization has an unbroken history starting back well over 5,000 years – and much of that history was built on the tireless labors of countless generations of donkeys. Today, along the irrigation canals from the Nile, you see the same age-old scenes: donkeys carrying loads, pulling carts brimming with produce, turning water wheels, carrying men and children and serving faithfully. You can see finely carved donkeys in Old and New Kingdom tombs and beautifully painted donkeys with sleek, long necks and ears in the Middle Kingdom tombs...and this is the same look of the modern Egyptian donkey. They're medium to large standard types with relatively fine bones but sturdy muscle mass. The most common color is white or white/grey, mixed with the occasional darker grey or more rarely brown. The donkey has been and continues to be the backbone of agricultural Egypt. And there are probably millions of them...no one really knows.

I was met at the entrance by Dr. Ahmed Mostafa, Veterinarian, who greeted me warmly. The Brooke does get its share of visitors and they are justifiably proud to show their facility. Also on hand to greet me was the Senior Veterinarian, Dr. Awad Gomaa. It was Dr. Gomaa who inaugurated The Brooke veterinary services in 1988, driving his vet truck over about a 100 mile area to serve the donkeys where they lived. He doctored the truck when necessary as well as the animals...and when the Aswan Clinic was built in 1991 the facility then had a permanent base of operations in Upper Egypt.

As we were discussing the clinic's history a young boy came in with a bandaged donkey...a sore, obviously from a harness, was covered on the right side just below the spine. When the cover came off the wound was about 3 inches across and some 1-1/2 inches deep, clearly exposing the muscle tissue. Both doctors and a vet tech immediately examined this animal, cleaning, rewrapping and administering antibiotics. They estimated healing time would be about a month and this donkey was welcome to stay at the Clinic for as long as the healing would take. With some words of encouragement for the donkey's young owner, the two doctors explained that, by far, working injuries or accidents were the majority of cases treated. This is not from callous disregard - so many injuries are caused by lack of knowledge allied with people's utter dependence on these animals. To eat, both people and animals must work.

The Brooke's mission, besides healing, is to foster understanding of the animals' needs and normal behavior. A typical village visit from one of The Brooke Aswan mobile clinics always begins with education. For the information to be absorbed trust must be developed...and the free of charges services goes a long way to doing just that. A picture chart is set up and local village people learn the “Five Freedoms” necessary for a contented, productive life:

1. Freedom from disease.

2. Freedom from hunger and thirst (their visual charted examples of good vs. poor bodily condition come in very handy)

3. Freedom from pain.

4. Freedom from diverse, negative environmental conditions (extreme heat being a prime example in this part of the world), and,

5. Freedom to express normal behavior (donkeys just need time to be donkeys)

The first two “Freedoms” are obvious. Freedom from pain is a little more complex. Yes, The Brooke has treated donkeys with abscesses on their sides from constant hitting (“Yalla Yalla!!” meaning “MOVE!”)...but mostly pain is caused by ill-fitting harness or loads too heavy or not well balanced. Or feet that need attention. The Brooke has a saddle/harness maker who teaches how best to fashion a pulling harness, using rice straw to pad collars. And to pair that with a carrying rig that fits the animal and properly distributes the weight of its load. The Brooke's farrier works with local farriers and the owners to explain hoof balancing and proper trimming...these are vital as the local climate makes for a lot of very hard ground and constant pounding means abscesses. He's also skilled at crafting corrective shoes to counteract excessive wear & tear or for therapeutic reasons...like navicular disease. On these visits the vets also check teeth and float as needed.

Freedom from negative environmental factors in Upper Egypt usually means the extreme heat (it can reach 130 degrees F in the Upper Egypt summer). Donkeys need shade...and sometimes more extreme cooling. Dr. Gomaa told me that all local owners are encouraged to come and hose down their animals at the clinic. Just by hosing off body temperatures can drop from 40 degrees C (104 degrees F) to the more normal range of 38 C (100.4 F). This is exactly the kind of information and resource owners need to have.

And finally, donkeys need time to just be donkeys...a roll in the sand, the company of other donkeys...and an understanding that animals must have time to do what their instincts dictate.

So when the Aswan mobile clinics arrive in one of the 31 locations in Upper Egypt (having an estimated total population of some 90,000 working equines) out comes the chart and the villagers get their course on appropriate donkey care. The sick animals are treated, donkeys and horses are wormed, teeth floated, hooves trimmed (and hoof picks explained and distributed) and basic care and nutrition are always discussed. A mobile clinic can treat between 35 – 60 animals in a day's visit. Brooke doctors and aides have built local shelters and water troughs. Brooke doctors train owners in first aid to bring immediate help to their animals. More than that, The Brooke clinic visits schools with demonstrations, CD's and computer presentations on animal welfare...all to foster good animal husbandry practices at an early age. And an enhanced appreciation of the animal that contributes so much to their daily lives. And...the school kids are fascinated by it all.

On to my tour...the clinic's center courtyard is essentially the triage, first treatment and pre-op area where diagnoses are made and first aide given, and if necessary, the animal is washed for surgery. Next is the X-ray room complete with sling, and beyond that, the surgical suite. The scrupulous cleanliness in both these areas was obvious. The Pharmacy was well stocked with those common drugs we all of us who own equines are so familiar with...antibiotics, pain relievers, DMSO, wormers. And beyond that...the residence for equines on the mend...The Golden Paddock, as Dr. Gomaa and Dr. Mostafa called it, because here, for the patients, life IS good. It was here that we did the mane hair sample pulling for Dr. Phil Sponenberg.

There were six healing donkeys in residence, 3 jacks and 3 jennets. The males all had harness sore wounds; one female was recovering from a collapsed uterus and lost pregnancy, one from being set on fire by a small child who poured oil over the donkey's flank and then lit this (which speaks eloquently to the critical need for early age education) and the last with another harness sore. Dr. Mostafa did the actual mane pulling and the vet techs were on hand to distribute the carrots. I'd brought both a tweezers and some jiffy bags and hope these samples will be good ones. It’s possible for Egyptian donkeys to live to 30 years but, for the lucky few, 18 is essentially the end of their working lives...the oldest one at the clinic was 13. That said, so many of these animals don’t live to see their teens...with overwork and lack of an understanding of care being the primary life-shortening factors.

The hardest part of this visit for me was saying Goodbye. I spent the entire morning with these dedicated doctors and every question I had was answered fully and happily. I saw nothing but care, concern and compassion, and total dedication to this work...this work which, increasingly, is more and more valued by the local people. Those of us in the developed world who are lucky enough to share our lives with a companion donkey appreciate what an extraordinary partner and friend this animal can be. For those who depend absolutely on donkey power to eke out subsistence living...for these people The Brooke is no less than a godsend. And me, not often moved to tears, felt my eyes well a bit on seeing and understanding this enormously important mission that quietly makes life better here in a tiny backstreet in Aswan, Egypt.

Egypt is one of nine underdeveloped countries where the work of The Brooke has made a huge difference in the lives of more than 650,000 working equines. Their goal is, by 2016, to bring these same life-saving benefits to the estimated 5,000,000 suffering horses, donkeys and mules most at risk throughout the world. The Brooke very much welcomes interest and, of course, contributions, especially from those of us in the United States where their work isn't so well known. If you'd like to help, there's a donation link on www.thebrooke.org Please know that any amount will help improve many lives.