Fundraising
2025 Survivors of FGM/C- Perspectives, support, empowerment!
President 2024/2025 Sabine Schmitt (D)
***Triger Warning***
The following is about a serious human rights violation – thank you for your openness to deal with this topic
Worldwide, 230 million women and girls are affected by Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C). According to estimates by the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, there are around 80,000 affected womenliving in Germany. Many women, who have undergone genital circumcision as a child, suffer long-term physical problems related to the genital circumcision. The psychological consequences can also be immense.
For many years, the FIM advice center has made it its mission to advise affected women - in a culturally sensitive, low-threshold way and often in the woman's first language. The FIM consultants also support the women in accessing adequate medical care on their own initiative.
That's why we support the project initiated by FIM - Frauenrecht ist Menschenrecht/ women’s rights are human rights: FIM has started the development of an offer for the surgical treatment of those affected by FGM/C in Hessen with committed medical cooperation partners, and will continue to do so over the coming period.
Support comes from Priv.-Doz. Dr. med. Dan mon O'Dey, a world-renowned expert in the field, who developed a microsurgical procedure to restore female genitalia.
He continues to share his knowledge with the plastic surgeon Dr. med. Stefanie Adili, who has been volunteering at FIM for many years, to improve the long-term availability of care for those affected in Hessen.
The operation is a milestone in the care of those affected. The complex procedure makes it possible to restore the sensitivity, shape and function of the genitals. Reconstruction can significantly improve the patient's quality of life, giving them a pain-free life and the chance for fulfilling sexuality.
The project is supported and made possible by FIM's advisory services - because without good social work support, the administrative hurdles, as well as the internal conflicts on the way to the operation, would not be overcome for the majority of women.
In order to guarantee this very (time-)intensive care, FIM relies on financial support: to cover the additional costs for advice and support, to provide language training and to cover expenses, such as travel costs to examination appointments, special hygiene products or costs associated with further medical training. Last but not least, the funds will be used to purchase an examination table at FIM. This is necessary in order to ensure the low-threshold offer for initial examinations of women, who are specifically interested in the operation in the familiar premises by Dr. Adili.
By supporting the project, we want to ensure that many more women regain a large part of their quality of life, through reconstructive surgery.
2024 Food Connects. Cooking Bike Project. Inclusion Project For Deaf
President 2023/2024 Laura Melara-Dürbeck (I)
To break down further barriers, a cooking bike is intended to take the Resto-Café’s Sinn & Wandel mission out into the world among “hearing and speaking people” (https://www.sinnwandel.com)
. A moveable cooking station that can be used at events and festivities! With our donation, we are helping people to help themselves; deaf people to ride the Cooking Bike to street festivals, the banking district and the city center, to be present at private events, and to offer food and drinks to hearing people, to create and secure jobs for deaf people in the café. At the same time, the visibility of deaf people in the city center is increased and new contacts and points of contact are created between hearing and deaf people. The profit generated by the Cooking Bike flows back into charitable projects to support deaf people, so our start-up funding will continue to bear fruit.
With the Cooking Bike, the support of the IWC is highlighted so that everyone can see that the members of the IWC stand strongly on the side of deaf people and people with disabilities.
(In cooperation with the Hessian Association für Deaf and Hearing Impaired People e.V. https://hvghm.de)
2023 Supporting Research into the Disease ME/CFS
President 2022/ 2023 Charlotte Weitbrecht (D)
The fundraising project this year is in support of the research by Prof. D. med. Carmen Scheibenbogen and her team at the Charite in Berlin into the disease ME/CFS.
By supporting the “ME/CFS Research Foundation” (https://mecfs-research.org/en/), we aim to provide funding for the current ME/CFS medical research conducted by Prof. Scheibenbogen and her team. Thereby promoting recognition by the social welfare authorities of ME/CFS as a disease and protecting those affected from social marginalization.
What is ME/CFS?
ME/CFS stands for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and is a severe, neuroimmunological disease which very often leads to a high degree of physical disability. Many patients are bedridden or house bound. The disease usually occurs after a viral infection, e.g. influenza, Epstein-Bar virus infection or COVID-19. Women are predominantly affected by this disease.
ME/CFS patients experience a marked worsening of their symptoms after low levels of physical or mental exertion. This includes a variety of symptoms, the most common being: Severe fatigue (pathological exhaustion, especially in the form of post-exertional malaise, i.e. worsening of symptoms after even minor physical, mental or emotional exertion), cognitive disorders, pronounced pain, significant circulatory problems (so-called orthostatic intolerance), hypersensitivity to sensory stimuli and a disorder of the immune system and the autonomic nervous system.
Many doctors are not familiar with this disease, but classify it as a psychosomatic disorder or as symptoms of burn-out syndrome or depression. The patients affected have often been through a long odyssey of doctors and experts and are completely desperate.
In addition, almost 60% of them become incapacitated or even unable to work. Health insurance companies, pension and occupational disability insurances often still do not recognize this clinical picture, so that many patients end up having to live on social welfare.
Before the pandemic, there were estimated 300.000 people affected by the disease in Germany, including 40.000 children. Since “Long Covid” can also lead to ME/CFS in the most severe cases, the number of people with the disease has probably doubled in the last three years; exact figures are not yet available.
So far, there are no specific biomarkers for the diagnosis of this disease and no causal therapies. Although there are some promising approaches to treating this disease, they need to be tested and substantiated by further studies.
The research team led by Prof. Dr. med. Carmen Scheibenbogen has been tackling this task for years.
2022 "Feel, See and Grasp - a tactile model of the Saalburg Roman Fort".
President 2021/2022 Yong-Hi Yim-Siegels (ROK)
In Roman times The Saalburg was a fort with a camp village on the border of the Roman Empire, adjacent to the Germanic tribal areas. It was rebuilt around 1900 on the initiative of Kaiser Wilhelm II. Since 2005, the site, which is unique in the world, has had the status of a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage.
The fundraising project "Feel, See and Grasp - a tactile model of the Saalburg Roman Fort" is intended to enhance the participation of all population groups in cultural education. It shows the basic structure and architecture of the Roman fort on the Saalburg Pass near Bad Homburg v.d.H. Exemplary for all Roman forts along the Limes, the special characteristics of such complexes and their significance for architectural history are to be directly experienced with the senses. The tactile model will provide new access to the central content of the museum's work not only for the sighted, but especially for the blind, the visually impaired and wheelchair users. It will enable the museum to take a big step further on the way to the greatest possible accessibility.
Touch as a defining dimension. The design of the model takes up the characteristic shape of the floor plan based on ergometric considerations. For example, the pedestal, which can be accessed from underneath, enables barrier-free access to the model. The focus on touch requires a clear reduction of the architecture depicted while, at the same time, an exaggeration of small-scale aspects so that they can be perceived by the fingers.
At the planned location in front of the main gate of the Saalburg, the bronze tactile model will be the first point of contact and orientation, thus providing a sculptural introduction to the world of the Romans in the Taunus.
2021 Scheuern Foundation: "Im Leben leben"
Establishment of an agility studio for people with severe disabilities
President 2020/2021 Dr. Sabine LangHeinrich-Bartsch (D):
The Scheuern Foundation in Nassau is one of the largest institutions for people with disabilities in Rhineland-Palatinate. Its goal is inclusion: Stiftung Scheuern is committed to ensuring that the approximately 650 people it cares for - people with mental disabilities, acquired brain damage, or mental illness - can participate in social life. Working and self-determined- living: with a holistic concept, the foundation supports the residents in all areas of life. A wide range of therapeutic and recreational activities is available to the foundation's residents.
In the donation project "Fit im Leben" (Fit in Life), the IWC supports the establishment of an agility studio for people with severe disabilities in the Schloss Laurenburg residential home.
The project aims to offer people with disabilities necessary physical exercise opportunities to improve their physical and psychological well-being. For this purpose, a special room with essential equipment and materials, individually adapted to the residents' motor and cognitive abilities, will be provided.
Other projects that have been supported in recent years
2020 Frankfurter Verein zur Unterstützung psychisch kranker Kinder und Jugendlicher e.V.
President 2019/2020 Roseann Padula (USA)
2019 Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung
President 2018/2019 Cornelia Klaus (D)
2018 Lazarus Wohnsitzlosenhilfe e.V.
President 2017/2018 Béatrice Portoff (F)
2017 Live Music Now Frankfurt am Main e.V.
President 2016/2017 Susanne Held (D)
2016 Stiftung „Joblinge – gemeinsam gegen Jugendarbeitslosigkeit“ Frankfurt am Main
President 2015/2016 Elena Vonofakou (GR)
2015 Stiftung Palmengarten und Botanischer Garten Frankfurt am Main „Duftgarten für Blinde“
President 2014/2015 Sigrid Volk (D)
2014 The English Theater Frankfurt gGmbH „English Drama Network“
President 2013/2014 Yumiko Wiesheu (J)
2013 Christliches Kinder- und Jugendwerk e.V. Frankfurt „Die Arche“
President 2012/2013 Annette Haag (D)
2012 Bärenherz Stiftung für schwerstkranke Kinder Wiesbaden
President 2011/2012 Anna-Maria Eiden (FIN)
2011 Innocence in danger e.V
President 2010/2011 Brigitte Biedermann (D)
2010 Städel Museum „Frankfurt baut das neue Städel“
President 2010/2011 Annemarie Moritz (A)