Easter Island's isolation draws tourists fascinated with the mysteries of how humans first made their way to the globe's most remote populated island, how they developed their culture and how they erected enormous statues of faces carved from volcanic rock. But living on a tiny island thousands of miles from the nearest hospital is not as romantic as it may seem. Two-year-old Ariki's skull was fractured by a horse in November and she survived only because the Chilean government spent $30,000 to rent a private plane to fly her 2,500 miles to a hospital on mainland Chile. "If they hadn't taken her, she would have died," said Ariki's mother Ana Liempi. Ariki's case is not unique. Minimal medical supplies, educational resources, transport and even difficulty in getting rid of garbage are daily problems for the island's 3,800 people. The remoteness of the 70-square-mile island, has earned it the nickname in the native tongue "Te Pito te Henua," or the navel of the world. Rapa Nui, as it is called by the people who live there, is closer to Pitcairn island, a British colony 1,200 miles away, than Chile, which has had dominion over the island for 115 years.

Accidents can be life-threatening on an island that has only three doctors, one dentist, a run-down hospital that was donated by the United States after the Vietnam war, and no daily flight to the mainland.There are only two flights a week from mainland Chile between March and June and three a week in the peak tourist season from July to February. Most tourists are drawn by giant stone heads, some 20 feet tall and carved between 400 and 1,300 years ago. The heads weigh up to 82 tons. "It's crazy that we have to travel thousands of miles for an operation or to treat an accident," said Alberto Hotus, president of a local association of senior citizens.

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