Ripples from the Rupununi
Dr. Aidun's Healing Journey
by Brian H. Cameron

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Somewhere over the rainforest in Guyana there’s a land called the Rupununi, a creek-crossed savannah inhabited for millenia by Indigenous people of great capacity. This is where Dr. Jamshid Aidun, a Persian Canadian surgeon and a humble man of faith, went to lead the Bahá’í Community Health Partnership, and to heal his own broken heart. Moving to Guyana from his surgical practice in Manitoba, Aidun was the only doctor for 17,000 people scattered across a region the size of Nova Scotia. For five years, he performed life-saving surgeries and travelled by Land Rover, canoe, bicycle, bullock cart, and on foot, accompanying Macushi and Wapishana villagers to take charge of their own health care. Sourced from detailed interviews with Aidun and many key players, and from his own journals, Ripples from the Rupununi traces the transformation of an Indigenous community that was historically underestimated. Finding spiritual strength in service, Aidun rediscovered love and healed himself while he healed others.

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"Aidun came to be regarded as a role model, inspiring Indigenous youth to pursue medical careers long after he departed the Rupununi." — Laureen Pierre, EdD, former Researcher, University of Guyana's Amerindian Research Unit. "What the various programs did for us was life-changing, preparing us for what is happening today and in the future. Through education we are fiercely proud of who we are." — Hon. Vincent P. Henry, Member of Parliament, Guyana. "I vividly recall Dr. Aidun walking part of the distance to Karasabai, after having swum across a creek, walking in his bare ‘buckta’, coffee mug in one hand, and a stick in the other, looking like a latter-day Gandhi." — Brian O'Toole, MBE, PhD, author of Educational Leadership: A Guyanese Perspective. "The approaches demonstrated by the work of Dr. Aidun, Indigenous leaders, and the Bahá'í community in the Rupununi are now taught to change leaders around the world." — Somava Saha, MD MS, Founder, President & CEO Well-being and Equity (WE) in the World "The first assault on inequity for health care was started by people like Dr. Aidun." — His Excellency Dr. Leslie Ramsammy, Guyana's Permanent Representative to the UN Office in Geneva. "Aidun is a Tsunami of Love." — Dr. Rick Czerniejewski, Co-founder, Health for Humanity.

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Dr. Jamshid Aidun was born into a Bahá'í family in Iran. He trained in India, Pakistan, and New York before migrating to Canada and practicing Urology in Brandon, Manitoba for twenty years. Two years after being widowed, he moved to Guyana in his late fifties and continued providing surgical care there into his eighties. He lives in Toronto with his wife Molly, and still rises early for prayers, exercises, and his daily walk. Dr. Brian H. Cameron is a Professor Emeritus of Pediatric Surgery at McMaster University. He worked in Canada's north, the South Pacific, and the rural United States before returning to Canada. Inspired by Dr. Aidun, he co-founded a surgical training program in Guyana. In 2021 he was awarded the M. Andrew Padmos International Collaboration Award of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. He lives in Dundas with his wife Pat.

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Contributors

Author

Brian H. Cameron

Foreword

Laureen Pierre