A fascinating and harrowing account of the men and women who struggle to improve the lives of people in desperate need. Doctors Without Borders (also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF) is arguably the best known humanitarian organization in the world. These professional men and women deliver emergency aid to victims of armed conflict, epidemics and natural disasters as well as to many others who lack reliable health care. Each year, more than 2,500 volunteer doctors, nurses and other professionals join locally hired staff to provide medical aid and health care in more than 80 countries. At the forefront of this organization and its work are the volunteer doctors and other health professionals who risk their lives to perform surgery, establish or rehabilitate hospitals and clinics, run nutrition and sanitation programs, and train local medical personnel. This book follows these men and women on location as they risk their own health, well-being and lives to treat patients in desperate need. These engaging true stories with dramatic color photographs examine the lives of individual volunteer medical professionals from around the world who: Perform emergency surgery in the war-torn regions of Africa and Asia Treat the homeless in the streets of Europe Understand cultural customs and societal differences that affect health care Witness and report genocidal atrocities. This new paperback edition is updated to include events that occurred following publication of the hardcover. Hope in Hell chronicles the raucous founding of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the organization. If there is a horrific event, MSF will be there. This book tells why and how.

Dan Bortolotti is a journalist whose work appears regularly in in books and magazines across North America.

Dan Bortolotti is a journalist whose work appears regularly in in books and magazines across North America.

Chapter 9: New Fridge Syndrome Kenny Gluck knew something was up when he saw a car slide out from the roadside to block the convoy he was traveling in. "We had left the hospital in four vehicles, and we hadn't even gotten out of the town yet when two cars cut us off -- one in the front, one in the back -- and a bunch of people in masks and carrying Kalashnikovs got out." The men opened fire, but no one was hit -- their goal wasn't to kill but to scare. "And they succeeded," Gluck says dryly. "They pulled me out of our car and pushed me into theirs. They whacked me over the head with a rifle butt and then put a coat over my head so I couldn't see." It was January 9, 2001, and Gluck, 38 at the time, was MSF-Holland's head of mission for the North Caucasus, which includes war-torn Chechnya. On the day he was abducted, Gluck was leaving the town of Stariye Atagi, about 12 miles from the Chechen capital of Grozny. It's an area he knows well, having worked in Chechnya from 1994 to 1996 with another NGO, and since early 2000 with MSF. He's fluent in Russian, too, though it didn't help him that day in the kidnappers' car. "They didn't say anything except, 'Shut up and keep your head down.' We drove for about an hour, switched cars, then they put me in a house where we waited for a while." Gluck was moved three times that first night, before being forced into the root cellar of another house. The floorboards were just a few feet above him, making it difficult to sit up. Onions, cabbages and carrots lay on the rocky dirt floor, along with a mattress that would be Gluck's bed for the next nine nights. Kidnapping is something of a national pastime in Chechnya, and expats are not exempt from the violence. In 1995, veteran aid worker Fred Cuny visited Chechnya on behalf of billionaire philanthropist George Soros, only to disappear in April. It's assumed he was murdered, along with three colleagues, though their bodies have never been found. The following year, six Red Cross workers -- four Europeans, a Canadian and a New Zealander -- were sleeping in their hospital compound, not far from where Gluck was abducted, when they were executed by masked men carrying guns fitted with silencers. Then Camilla Carr and Jon James, British psychologists working with a small Quaker NGO, were abducted in July 1997 and held for 14 months. By the time Carr and James were released, MSF had pulled out of Chechnya because of the insecurity, but by February 2000 they were back. And so were the kidnappings -- that August three more Red Cross workers were abducted, though they were released after a week. In all, at least 50 humanitarian aid workers have been kidnapped in the North Caucasus since 1996. Finding those responsible for these attacks is extremely difficult. To begin with, the abductors do not usually make ransom demands; often there is no negotiation at all. The region's power politics are complex -- Gluck estimates there are 50 or 60 active military groups, and their alliances are rarely clear. So, when he was dragged from the car and MSF received no communication from his attackers, the trail quickly turned cold. The organization immediately suspended all its activities in the area and called on the Russian authorities to investigate, but even Gluck himself didn't know why he was being held. "They talked to me quite a bit, but I didn't feel that the people talking to me were the decision makers; they were just guards. They said they were hoping to trade me for captured people, but I don't know if that was true. They were Chechens, I could tell that, but I didn't know whether they were fighting on the Russian side or the anti-Russian side. I didn't get to those questions." Gluck's case is proof that the best type of security is being known in the community. "All the Chechen doctors there knew me, and I had a lot of friends in this area, and they were getting in touch with everybody -- Russian groups