USNS Comforts Set Sail to 12 Ports

The HHS team on the deck of the USNS Comfort.

From left to right: CAPT MacMahon, Chief of Staff, USNS Comfort, U.S. Department of Defense (DoD); CAPT Craig Shepherd, Chief Environmental Health Officer, U.S. Public Health Service, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS); The Honorable Michael O. Leavitt, Secretary of Health and Human Services; CAPT Bruce Boynton, Commanding Officer, USNS Comfort, DoD; and ADM John Agwunobi, M.D., HHS Assistant Secretary for Health.

June 20, 2007 - On June 15, the USNS Comfort set sail on its 120-day humanitarian mission to 12 Latin American and Caribbean ports.

A cadre of 16 physicians, dentists, and other uniformed health professionals from the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) are on board the Comfort.  These men and women will be helping to offer medical care to thousands of people as the ship docks in Belize, Guatemala, and Panamá in the months of June and July.

Another team of HHS Commissioned Corps officers will relieve the first group in mid-July, and a total of 69 HHS health professionals will serve aboard the Comfort over the course of the mission. The HHS contingent is under the command of CAPT Craig Shepherd, the PHS Chief Environmental Health Officer.

For more information:

• Mission to Latin America and Caribbean
• USNS Comfort website
• President Bush Orders the USNS Comfort to Latin America and the Caribbean on Humanitarian Mission (White House) 

Last revised: July 27, 2007