U.S. sailors provide medical care to villagers in landmark Cambodia visit

The sailors from a U.S. warship named USS Gary on Saturday conducted community relations events, providing medical care to villagers, during the first U.S. Navy visit to Cambodia in more than 30 years.

During their second day on land, sailors painted a clinic and fixed its rain gutter in a village near Cambodia's main port city of Sihanoukville, where their ship docked.

At a nearby Buddhist pagoda, about 200 villagers lined up to get their health checked by a team of warship doctors.

The small medical team of two primary care doctors, two dentists and their assistants are joined by local physicians and the Sihanoukville Public Health Department to provide primary health services to local villagers in the two day medical civic action event on Saturday and Sunday, according to a press release from the U.S. embassy.

The USS Gary is the first American naval vessel to make a port call in Cambodia in the past 32 years, Joseph Mussomeli, U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia, said to reporters, adding that the visit symbolizes strengthening ties between Cambodia and the United States.

The USS Gary is an Oliver Hazard Perry Class guided missile frigate. This class currently consists of 51 ships making it the largest single class of warships built by a Western Nary since World War Two, the press release said.

The ship, which is 453 feet in length, has a crew of 21 officers and 203 enlisted personnel, it said.
The USS Gary is scheduled to make a ship visit to Cambodia from Feb. 9 to Feb. 13, it added.

Source: Xinhua