The Touch Healers
The situation
The island of Hispaniola is divided by a 392-kilometre border, including 164 kilometres with a physical wall. Military patrols — CESFRONT on the Dominican side and POLIFRONT on the Haitian side — enforce control amid growing surveillance, tension and structural inequality. We call this phenomenon "Walled Globalization", where states increasingly erect walls despite living in a hyperconnected world. Today there are more than 70 border walls worldwide.
The border is divided not only by the wall but also by the Massacre River, a geographical and symbolic divider, with four official crossing points: Pedernales–Anse-à-Pitre, Comendador–Belladère, Jimaní–Malpasse, and Ouanaminthe–Dajabón. On market days, up to 16,000 people cross daily, carrying heavy loads in search of work or basic survival.
Access to dignified healthcare is scarce, and both Haitian and Dominican health services are overburdened. Dajabón, home to the largest binational market in Latin America, is a hub of trade and human movement, yet vulnerability, corruption and precarity are ever-present. Some jobs exist thanks to CODEVI (Compagnie de Développement Industriel S.A.), a free-trade industrial park owned by the Capellán family, which has alleviated some unemployment in Juana Méndez and nearby Haitian towns. Even so, Juana Méndez, with 150,000 inhabitants, has many people living on the streets, orphaned children and predominantly informal, low-paying work, while access to healthcare is practically nonexistent.
What we are doing
At WTTW we support and bring visibility to the work of Mission Life International Foundation, founded by Dr. Peter Morgan, D.C., through our ongoing documentary The Touch Healers. Each year Mission Life International carries out 6 to 7 humanitarian missions involving 50 to 100 volunteer chiropractors who travel to Dajabón to offer free chiropractic adjustments to anyone in need. They do not work behind closed doors: they set up tables in the streets, the binational market, outside CODEVI, at customs, and even on the bridge crossing the Massacre River.
With one word — "Touche, touche" ("touch, touch" in Haitian Kreyòl) — they invite people closer without asking what side they are on, serving workers, merchants, soldiers, elders and children indiscriminately. They also visit hospitals, military centres, orphanages and senior homes throughout Dajabón. To date they have completed 127 missions, adjusting more than 1,950,000 people, including over 550,000 children, and they train new generations of healers through their Pediatric Adjusting Boot Camp.
How can you support? Share the documentary on social media or with media outlets that support human rights and human connection. Donate to Mission Life International. Join as a Touch Healer by inviting chiropractors worldwide to participate in ChiroMissions. Connect us with brands, institutions or foundations that could support this work. Invite WTTW or Mission Life International to present at your university, festival or community centre.