Thirty years ago, Rabbi Moshe Hillel Zary founded Derech Harambam, a charity society dedicated to the goal of assisting disadvantaged families and helping them emerge from the poverty cycle. The organization’s range of projects includes mass distributions of food, clothing and shoes; an annual distribution of knapsacks and school supplies for school-age children; and subsidizing the cost of dental care. Throughout the years, Derech Harambam endowed huge sums of money in financial aid to thousands of families in Israel, while granting them emotional support to continue facing and surmounting the challenges. Their efforts have earned international admiration and appreciation from welfare societies, and the organization featured on several television and radio programs.
Following tragic family circumstances that affected the organization’s founder, Derech Harambam shifted focus twelve years ago to begin supporting cancer patients and their families by funding and/or subsidizing expensive medicines while simultaneously raising public awareness regarding the importance of early cancer screening.
Cancer medicine is prohibitively expensive, often reaching a cost of tens of thousands of shekels a month for a single patient. Since many cancer medications are not covered by the Ministry of Health, thousands of families face the near-impossible task of raising exorbitant sums of money each month in the hope of saving the life of their loved one. With the vast majority of families unable to continue covering these costs for more than several months before they face utter financial ruin, and many unable to afford the cost of even the first month, there is a shocking death toll of over 16,000 Israeli citizens who perish each year due to untreated cancer.
Cancer can strike any part of the body at any time, destroying vital organs including the brain, blood, lungs, liver, kidney, breast, intestines, lymph nodes, prostate, to name but a few. For many years, pharmaceutical companies worked to develop and patent assorted cancer medications, which resulted in the scandalously high costs of these medicines.
Examples of costly, life-saving medicines include Tarceva, intended to treat lung cancer which costs $4,500 per month; Nexavar for liver cancer for $6,300 a month; Emwinaze for blood cancer for $7,100 a month; Sutent for kidney cancer for $8,750 a month; and Herceptin for breast cancer for $3,950 a month.
Breast cancer is the #1 killer of women around the world, and especially Jewish women. A shocking 1 of 7 Jewish women will be diagnosed with breast cancer at some point in her life. (To date, extensive research has failed to indicate why Jewish female genes are more susceptible to breast cancer than their non-Jewish peers.) However, early screening, diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer are vital and can save lives!
Armed with this knowledge and determined to spread the word among Jewish women, Derech Harambam founded its national Mammography Project four years ago to raise public awareness regarding early screening of breast cancer. The Mammography Project sponsors informative assemblies and seminars throughout the State of Israel to teach women about the life-saving importance of conducting regular mammograms and screenings that identify the disease in its early stages. The ability to fight and vanquish breast cancer is largely dependent on the stage in which it was detected; the early it is discovered, the better chance a woman has to recover and heal without agonizing and unnecessary chemotherapy treatments.
Along with sharing the medical aspects and attributes of the Mammography Project, Derech Harambam seminars also spotlight women who were former breast cancer patients and who willingly share their personal tale of struggle and triumph. The seminar opens with an introduction by founder and director Rabbi Moshe Zary, but then he immediately departs the hall, leaving the lecturers and guests to speak openly, woman-to-woman, about their personal stories, issues, fears and concerns regarding breast cancer. Guests are invited and encouraged to ask any question under the sun, including intimate ones, without fear or shame.
Throughout the past years, Derech Harambam has hosted seminars in Tiberias, Kiryat Shemona, Zefat, Haifa, Beit She’an, Hadera, Netania, Hod Shasharon, Holon, Ashdod, Jerusalem, Beit Shemesh, Maale Adumim, Beer Sheba, and Dimona, etc., raising public awareness on the relevant issues and urging thousands of women to go for early screenings. In the meanwhile, the organization has received numerous appeals to host seminars in other Israeli cities, as well as repeated and/or follow-up assemblies in cities that already benefited from them in the past.
The cost of funding this giant enterprise that assists thousands of cancer patients and prevents countless deaths in Israel amounts to millions of dollars annually, and our organization is still besieged with desperate requests for help. Thus we turn to you, dear friend, with a heartfelt cry to please support us and help us continue saving thousands of lives!
All donations to Derech Harambam are tax-exempt in the USA.