An extraordinary crusade against neglected diseases

Former US President Jimmy Carter's decades-long campaign to rid Africa of a painful parasitic disease is unmatched

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ALWAYS REFERRED to as the peanut farmer from Georgia, an outsider who made it to the White House, Jimmy Carter was even more of an unusual figure after he demitted office. He was possibly the most extraordinary ex-president America has ever had, undertaking several peace missions to end conflicts across the globe and launching public health campaigns in the poorest of countries. One cannot remember any other former president and his wife trekking to the remote corners of Chad and Ethiopia to deliver medicines and hope to the sick and needy; or lobbying heads of government constantly to remind them that access to healthcare is a basic right they need to provide in the larger interest of social well-being.

The transformation of Carter from a typical American leader to an exceptional promoter of humanitarian initiatives, especially global health, was unexpected given his record in office. His one term as President was marked by a landmark foreign policy triumph and ended with the disaster of the Iranian hostage crisis, the reason why he failed to get re-elected. Some would perhaps list his Camp David Accords of 1978, which led to the signing of a peace treaty between then Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin—a treaty that the Arab world viewed as a sell-out to the Zionist state—as historic. There was even more unhappiness over the US boycott of the 1980 Olympics held in the Soviet Union because of its invasion of Afghanistan. The boycott was hugely unpopular in the US, too, and Carter admitted much later that it was “a bad decision”.