‘Serving Where It Matters Most’
I sat down with Suzanne Rath on her podcast “Endures” to talk Cape York, Ukraine, and thirty years of showing up. Listen now — and consider chipping in.
Somewhere between recounting thirty years of rural clinics and describing what it’s like when the temperature and the shelling both drop below zero at the same time, I realised “quite a lot” was an understatement for my life. Check out my conversation with Suzanne Rath on her podcast Endures. .
Suzanne and I talked about the long arc: rural, remote and Indigenous health across Cape York, the twenty-plus years my husband Ron and I have spent running a small charity for Indigenous youth, and — more recently — the work I do with Only Passing Thru, delivering medical training and supplies to healthcare workers on Ukraine’s front lines.
“They wanted to freeze people to demoralise them.”
That line from the episode has already stuck with people who’ve heard it. Russia’s deliberate targeting of heating and power through winter isn’t collateral damage — it’s strategy. It’s the kind of sentence that’s hard to say and harder to hear, and exactly the kind of thing that gets lost in a news cycle unless someone says it plainly. So I said it plainly.
Mostly, though, this was a conversation about service — what it costs, what it gives back, and why turning up again and again, in Cape York or in Kherson Oblast, still matters more than any single grand gesture. Three decades in, I can confirm: the paperwork has not gotten more fun. Everything else has been worth it.
If the conversation moves you the way these conversations tend to move people — a reminder that Only Passing Thru supports Ukraine with service AND donations. Every dollar goes toward medical supplies, training, and keeping the Ukrainian workers on the road. You can chip in at passingthrough.net/donating.
I sat down with Suzanne Rath on her podcast “Endures” to talk Cape York, Ukraine, and thirty years of showing up. Listen now — and consider chipping in.
Before Ukraine, there was Kowanyama. Watch our thank-you message to the community that shaped us, and hear why our hearts are now with Ukraine.
Dr Lara Wieland tells ACRRM’s Life Hacks how rural generalism prepared her for Ukraine — and how you can help build MedLearnUke.
Today we start the 3-4 day trip to Ukraine for a five-month deployment. Here’s what we’re doing, and how you can stand with us.
We’re back in Ukraine for five months. Borders, bureaucracy, air raid sirens and watermelons the size of small children — mission one begins.