A series of powerful earthquakes unleashed massive tsunami waves across Asia killing more than an estimated 226,000 people in six different countries. Earthquakes originating off the west coast of the Indonesian island of Sumatra triggered the tsunamis. Villages and resorts were slammed with waves of water, some reaching as high as 20 feet. The strongest earthquake measured 8.9 on the Richter scale, making it the most powerful earthquake in 40 years.

It seems certain that the death toll will rise and that the destruction will be unthinkable. Families across Southeast Asia, stricken by disaster during this holiday season, need your help to recover and rebuild - many have lost everything. Support the organizations providing assistance to those whose lives have been devastated by this terrible disaster.

With this latest disaster, we felt compelled to do what we could for the victims of this tragedy. Therefore, ValueMD pledged to match, dollar for dollar, any donations made by the ValueMD community through January 1, 2004. This means that anyone who gave any money to this effort by this date doubled the amount given because we donated an equal amount in their names.

We received such an overwhelming response from some generous users that we nearly doubled our goal in only 3 days. However, since ValueMD was committed to the cause, we decided to match each and every donation anyway, despite having gone way over budget. A special thanks to all those who have donated so far, but especially to the top 3 users who made very generous donations in amounts of $300, $100 and $100.

Because ValueMD is a website based on International Medical Education, we felt the most appropriate charitable organizations to support were the American Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders. In emergencies and their aftermath, Doctors Without Borders provides primary healthcare, performs surgery, rehabilitates hospitals and clinics, runs nutrition and sanitation programs, trains local medical personnel, and provides mental health care.