Health-care during the Algerian revolution
1–Introduction
At the outbreak of the holy revolution on November 1st 1954, the health sector was completely nonexistent in general, even the establishment of medical frameworks during this stage was mainly primitive, therefore, the first stage of the revolution between 1954 and 1956 experienced a lot of struggles in this critical and fundamental field, and it lasted until the students’ strike on May 19th 1956 and their joining to the revolution where they gave the health sector strength by having many medical, and pharmacy students, in addition to nursing students.
2– The establishment of the first unit of the medical sector during the revolution
The first unit of the medical field was formed during the revolution, starting from the student strike on May 19th 1956 that allowed the revolution to be reinforced by specialists of the medical sector. Moreover, the establishment of the first health unit of the revolution was the cause of the students’ actual supervision on the health sector, and the mission was to provide the adequate and necessary medical aid for the injured Mujahideen, to then move to the civil party by checking on the civil patients in the villages, hamlets, and the countryside. The operation was spread on all the cities, to then have a national and sensitization dimension at the same time, and the mission itself was not limited to the inside of Algeria only, but rather this sector’s mission was to take care of the Algerian refugees in Maghreb Al-Aqsa and Tunisia, and that was after the large influx of this population on the territories of the neighboring brotherly states.
3– The historical progress of the health sector during the revolution
The health sector went through many historical stages that were the reason for its progress and qualitative shift, because after its role was limited to primitive treatment initially, the specialists who joined the revolution renewed many types of hospitals. There was the renovation of the model hospitals whose first signs appeared in the second historical state, except that the progress of the internal situations through the grow of the French military force of all sorts: land-based, marine and aerial, led to the renovation of another type of hospitals which is the mobile hospitals, and its main objective was to not leave an opportunity for the enemy to takeover the medication and medical equipment when he breaks into the stations. Furthermore, in order to destroy the first health unit by the colonial authorities, the latter introduced strict control on the borders aiming at preventing the medical items heading to Algeria and seizing it so it wouldn’t fall into the hands of the Mujahideen. On another note, there were models of penalization of the French authorities for the Algerians involved in the support given to the revolution through medications and medical equipment coming from the eastern western borders.
4– The establishment of the Algerian red crescent:
After framing the health sector during the revolution starting from 1956, and due to the drastic conditions that the Algerians refugees were going through, it was necessary for the Algerian National Liberation Front to explain the deplorable conditions of the Algerians inside the country due to the arbitrary policy applied by the administration and the French army together which led to the escape of many Algerians to the neighboring brotherly states particularly Maghreb Al-Aqsa and Tunisia, and the objective was to gain the required and the necessary medical aid to improve the condition of the refugees. So, the Front initiated the establishment of an entity in the medical sector whose mission was to do its national and humanistic role, therefore the Algerian red crescent was established two years after the outbreak of the Algerian revolution. Moreover, the instructions of the National Liberation front for the members of the the red crescent’s office were clear, and it included not leaving the ideology of the Liberation Front aiming at enlightening the world with the Algerian people’s tragedy, and transmitting its struggles to the world’s people and humanistic governments, and the Moroccan city of Tanger was chosen as a headquarter, to then be transferred to Tunisia in 1957.
5– The responsibilities of the Algerian red crescent
The instructions of the Algerian red crescent were clear in order to make the world hear the Algerians’ voice and transmit their struggles. Moreover, through this action, the missions of the Algerian red crescent were clarified aiming at exposing the French colonization’ policy that scrapped all the norms and international laws causing the homelessness of Algerians and deporting them from their lands, villages and cities in order to empty the revolution from its mass content, therefore the tasks for which this humanistic entity was established were defined.
6– The members of the constitutive office of the Algerian Red Crescent:
After the headquarter of the Algerian Red Crescent was transferred from Tanger in Maghreb Al-Aqsa to Tunis the capital at the behest of the coordination and execution committee in 1957, the members of the Algerian Red Crescent’s office were designated, whose mission was to manage and watch over the instructions of the National Liberation Front to go along with the situations, and working on gaining bigger support from the humanistic entities across the world including the International Red Cross on top.
