![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Riekje-Elema-300x199.jpg\")
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Riekje Elema was born on February 10, 1957, in Groningen. She grew up in Huizinge on her parents’ farm, Framaheerd, where her brother Aldert still lives and farms today. After completing her secondary education, she moved to Groningen, where she trained as a nurse at the Academic Hospital. Following her training as a community nurse, she worked for several years as a community nurse in the city.<\/p>\n
In 1987, she moved to Africa to work for Doctors Without Borders. She spent a year in Uganda, where a civil war was raging, displacing people and exacerbating issues like malaria and the rise of AIDS. Famine led to a significant influx of malnourished children.<\/p>\n
After Uganda, she spent three years in Mozambique, where the situation and work were similar to those in Uganda. This was followed by two years in Kenya, where she worked in two refugee camps. In collaboration with organizations such as the World Food Programme and other UN aid agencies, she helped establish vaccination programs against malaria and tuberculosis.<\/p>\n
In 1995, Riekje returned to Amsterdam, where she worked for 15 years as a medical advisor for Doctors Without Borders.<\/p>\n
In 2004, she was deployed to Zambia, where she initiated an HIV\/AIDS project and made significant contributions in the field of malaria.<\/p>\n
Overall, Riekje worked in more than 30 countries worldwide.<\/p>\n
Throughout her career, she pursued various studies. She earned a Master’s in Community Health from the University of Liverpool and a Master’s in Medical Anthropology from VU Amsterdam.<\/p>\n
After her international period, Riekje worked for a time in a hospital in Amsterdam and established a neighborhood care team.<\/p>\n
Upon returning to Winsum (Groningen), she worked for a period in elderly care and at the Academic Hospital in Groningen.<\/p>\n
Riekje passed away on April 19, 2024, in Winsum.<\/p>\n
In her will, she arranged for the establishment of the Elema Fund. All her possessions were bequeathed to the fund with the mandate to support causes that align with her life’s work of improving the health of people who cannot achieve this on their own.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Riekje Elema was born on February 10, 1957, in Groningen. She grew up in Huizinge on her parents’ farm, Framaheerd, where her brother Aldert still lives and farms today. After completing her secondary education, she moved to Groningen, where she trained as a nurse at the Academic Hospital. Following her training as a community nurse, she worked for several years as a community nurse in the city. In 1987, she moved to Africa to work for Doctors Without Borders. She spent a year in Uganda, where a civil war was raging, displacing people and exacerbating issues like malaria and the… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":133,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/template-full-width.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-136","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":217,"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/136\/revisions\/217"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elemafonds.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}