CARE USA shifts into fundraising overdrive when disaster strikes, but its day-to-day development plan keeps it at the forefront of humanitarian-aid organizations.

By Margaret Battistelli Gardner

After Sept. 11, the world spotlight shone brightly on Afghanistan and its oppression of women, the plight of its war widows, and other human-rights issues that CARE addresses. The tsunami made it impossible for the world to turn a blind eye to its desperately poor inhabitants, and Katrina was a brutal reminder that the “poorest of the poor” are particularly vulnerable in times of crisis.