Red Cross + FIVE = Help For Homebound Italians

What does FIVE have in common with one of America's most famous writers?

It's not the number of novels said writer published.  You may have surmised as much because FIVE is capitalized.  

In fact, FIVE stands for Fabbrica Italiana Veicoli Elettrici, or the association of Italian Electric Vehicle Manufacturers.  (In Italian, FIVE is pronounced "fee-vay.")  They have been supplying electric bikes for a project called "Tempo della Gentilezza" ("Time for Kindness"), which delivers--in a sustainable "green" way-- essential services and goods to homebound elderly and immunodeficient people.  

Tempo della Gentilezza is a Red Cross project.  That brings me to my connection with a famous American writer.  A Farewell to Arms is based on its author's experience driving a Red Cross ambulance for the Italian Army during World War I.

We don't hear much about the vehicle Ernest Hemingway piloted.  I assume, perhaps wrongly, that it was made in Italy, like the e-bikes used in the Tempo project.  Now, I know Hemingway was a cyclist (and an avid bicycle racing fan), but I have to admit it's a bit of a stretch to picture him on an eBike.  Or is it? 

Bicycle Ambulances In Uganda Are FABIO!

There are some places that can't be reached easily, or at all, with cars or trucks.  In some places, like rural Uganda, that can be a matter of life and death. 


Uganda's infant, newborn and maternal mortality rates are among the highest in the world.   The harsh terrain spreads between the vast distances pregnant women often must traverse in order to get care for themselves or their newborns.  As an example, early in her pregnancy, Sandra Naigaga had to walk more than four kilometers (2.5 miles) to access antenatal care in Kibibi.  Later in her pregnancy, that distance may as well have been the distance to the moon.

Fortunately for her, the First African Bicycle Information Organization (FABIO:  Could you ask for a better acronym?)  introduced bicycle ambulance service to her region's two major health centers late last year.  FABIO has been offering similar services, ferrying pregnant women as well as other people needing medical care, in other parts of Uganda since 2006.

Sandra Naigaga (R) after arriving at the antenatal care centre in Kibibi

Aside from the services it provides, another thing that's great about FABIO is that it tries to maintain an environmentally sustainable system that can be easily maintained by local people using local materials from local sources.  So, the ambulances are built around basic black bicycles for which spare parts are readily available, even in such a remote region. And the carts that are attached to those bicycles are made from locally-sourced materials.  FABIO's ambulances are thus "African solutions to African problems," in the words of field officer Jeremiah Brian Nkuutu.  

Jeremiah Brian Nkuuti welding a carriage for a FABIO bicycle ambulance.

While most of the bicycle ambulances are of the pedaled, mechanical kind, FABIO also has ambulances towed by rechargeable e-bicycles.  These are used in hilly areas and, like the bicycles, are chosen for their reliability and the local availability of spare parts.