Our mission
Friends Without A Border provides free, high-quality healthcare in areas of dire need in Southeast Asia. We promote sustainable solutions to health care in developing countries by—
Treatment
We provide free, high-quality medical care to children 15 years of age and below in a compassionate environment.
Education
We provide health education to patients and their families, as well as medical education to health clinicians across Laos.
Prevention
We improve the health, nutrition and hygiene of local communities through outreach programs, education and home care.
Our history
In 1994 Kenro Izu witnessed a child die because her father couldn’t afford $2 care.
World-renowned Japanese photographer Kenro Izu first visited Cambodia in 1993 to photograph the Angkor Wat temples. During his travels, he often encountered ill and malnourished children, many missing arms and legs—a horrific legacy of America’s conflict in Vietnam. After witnessing a young girl die, simply because her father could not afford $2 for medical care, Kenro decided to take action and give back to the country that inspired his photographic journey.
In 1995 he founded Friends Without A Border to build Angkor Hospital for Children.
Friends Without A Border (FWAB) is a nonprofit organization with the mission to provide compassionate medical care to children in Southeast Asia. After years of planning and gathering support from donors, photographers and friends around the world, Friends Without A Border opened Angkor Hospital for Children (AHC) in 1999 in Siem Reap, Cambodia.
In 2013 FWAB transferred the administration of the hospital to local management.
Since opening its doors, AHC has treated nearly 2 million children, trained thousands of health-care professionals and was deemed “one of only three essential health-care institutions” in the entire country by a Cambodian health minister. In January of 2013, FWAB celebrated a long-held goal as Kenro handed over a heart-shaped “key to the hospital” to the dedicated staff of AHC, thus transferring the administration of the hospital to local management.
In 2016, LFHC opened a Neonatal Unit, as well as a Surgical Theater.
The Neonatal Unit and Surgical Theater greatly expanded the reach of services available to children in Laos. More recently, LFHC added a thalassemia clinic, a development clinic for disabled children, an expanded neonatal unit and a 24/7 ER. Today, the hospital staff sees more than 30,000 cases per year throughout its eleven departments.
In 2015 FWAB opened the doors to Lao Friends Hospital for Children in Laos.
After turning over AHC to local management, FWAB decided to expand its mission of helping the children of Southeast Asia into another country: Laos. On February 11, 2015, FWAB opened the doors to a new pediatric hospital: Lao Friends Hospital for Children (LFHC), in Luang Prabang. On opening day, the staff of LFHC treated 47 children in its Outpatient Department. In its first year of operation, LFHC treated nearly 20,000 children.
We believe every child has the right to a healthy and happy life.
