The Redemptoris Mater Hospital is on the plain of Ashotsk, 2,000 metres above sea level. It was built by Italian Caritas  in 1991 and then given by Pope John Paul II to the people of Armenia. The management of the hospital has been entrusted since its beginnings to the Camillians. With a hundred beds, it is the centre of a health-care system that covers twenty-two villages with clinics connected to the hospital. The population of the local health-care district is about 15,000 people.

Patients come to the hospital from neighbouring Georgia and from every part of Armenia. It is the only hospital that functions regularly and it offers a qualified and free service. There are four departments in the hospital: medicine, surgery, maternity and paediatrics. A paediatrician is employed to provide a service in the villages. Italian medical doctors go to the Redemptoris Mater Hospital to give refresher courses to the medical doctors and nurses who work in it. The area of action for the project is the one that was most hit by the earthquake of 7 December 1988 which caused over 25,000 victims. The earthquake raised to the ground the town of Spitak (20,000 inhabitants),entirely destroyed the city of Giumry (360,000 abitanti), as well as other inhabited centres, and devastated 400 villages.

Read here the interviews with Fr. Mario Cuccarollo, a Camillian who has been the head of the Redemptoris Mater Hospital since its beginnings.

L’Osservatore Romano – Avamposto della misericordia. L’ospedale Redemptoris Mater ad Ashtotsk – 19/06/15

Radio Vaticana – Armenia, l’attesa del Papa nelle parole di un religioso – 19/06/16