ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, January 19, 1996 TAG: 9601190028
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARK MORRISON STAFF WRITER
Hugh Wells can testify first-hand of the need for Sunday night's benefit concert at Patrick Henry High School to raise money for medicine and medical supplies for Roanoke's sister city in Russia, Pskov.
The 7:30 p.m. concert of Russian classical music, featuring husband-wife duo-pianists Gerhardt and Barbara Suhrstedt of Boston, will be held at the school's Clara Black Auditorium. Tickets are $10, and the Suhrstedts will be performing free of charge, so all proceeds will be donated to the Pskov cause.
Pskov is a Russian city of about 200,000 people that Dr. Wells, a neonatologist who works with newborn babies at Community Hospital in Roanoke, visited along with another Roanoke doctor in 1993. In Pskov, Wells worked for a week at the children's hospital and for a week at the city's maternity hospital.
``I have seen first-hand what their needs are, and they are extreme,'' he said.
He remembered an infant who was brought to the hospital with a grave infection. He asked the doctors on staff what sort of antibiotics they planned to give the child. Their answer was whatever - if anything - happens to be on hand.
``Basically, it's just whatever happens to be on the shelf,'' Wells said.
More often than not, he said, the shelves are pretty barren. Even aspirin is sometimes scarce.
Wells said the problem is that since the breakup of the Soviet Union, the government no longer controls the production and distribution of medical supplies. That system is now making the transition to capitalism and the free marketplace. And with the growing pains associated with such a transition, there are shortages.
``It used to be that the government took care of the people. Now, they're more on their own,'' Wells said.
He explained that the hospitals now have to buy their medicine and supplies, but like most segments of Russian society, the hospitals are strapped for cash. So pharmaceutical companies in the former Soviet Union that once had to supply the hospitals now are selling their products to markets in Europe and elsewhere that can afford them.
``There's just no money,'' Wells said. ``The same is true for bus parts, tea and everything else.''
It is frustrating, he said, particularly for the doctors that he observed on his visit in 1993, who generally are well-trained and knowledgeable about the latest in modern medicine. They are just handicapped by the lack of supplies.
``My observation was that many of the sicker infants I saw probably didn't make it, who we could have taken care of in this country and who would have survived,'' he said.
Recognizing the problem, the Roanoke-Pskov Sister City Committee, which formed in 1990, targeted medical needs as its primary goodwill project. Since then, visitors from Roanoke have traveled to Pskov, they have carried with them a shipment of medicine.
Money raised from Sunday's concert will go toward buying supplies for the next sister city trip, which is planned for the spring.
And while Wells acknowledged that their concert and the sister city effort won't solve the problem in Pskov, he echoed an often-repeated cliche that he said needs to be repeated. ``No, we're not making huge changes, but if the medicine arrives at the right time, we might save one child's life.''
The Suhrstedts are one of the few touring one-piano, four-hand duos in the country. They have been performing since 1979 and typically play about 125 concerts a year. Gerhardt Suhrstedt is a native of Charleston, S.C., and a graduate of Furman University. Barbara Suhrstedt is a native of Ohio and a graduate of the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music. The couple met and married while completing graduate work at Boston University's School of the Arts.
LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Gerhardt and Barbara Suhrstedt of Boston will perform aby CNBconcert of one-piano, four-hand music at Patrick Henry High School
on Sunday.