The youngest person to visit all 195 countries spoke to about 35 members and guests of the Rancho Bernardo Rotary Club on Thursday, Oct. 1, at The Heights Golf Club. Cameron Mofid, 25, told the audience how severe OCD launched a seven-year global journey that ended with a world record and a nonprofit serving hundreds of children in Nigeria.
Mofid's record was verified by NomadMania, the world's largest extreme travel community. He completed the quest on April 3, 2025, when he entered North Korea by running in the Pyongyang Marathon.
He shared experiences from three countries that shaped him, according to the club's meeting bulletin. In Nigeria, meeting an orphan led him to build an orphanage. In Afghanistan, a young woman's determination to pursue education despite discrimination left a mark. North Korea, his 195th and final country, capped the mission.
OCD as the starting line
Mofid was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) at age 12, according to Irish Star. The condition damaged his grades, his performance in international junior tennis tournaments and his relationships with friends and family, he wrote on his personal website.
In college, he read that more people had been to space than had visited every country. That fact reframed his disorder as a challenge he could attack head-on.
"What could be more uncertain than crossing into war zones, jungles, and deserts with no idea what's waiting for you?" Mofid wrote on his website.
He treated the travel as real-world exposure therapy.
Along the way he was detained under false espionage charges, hospitalized after drinking unpasteurized camel's milk and backpacked through Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. He took more than 500 flights over seven years, according to CBS 8 San Diego.
From traveler to nonprofit founder
A visit to Makoko, a fishing community in Lagos, Nigeria, where more than 200,000 people live on wooden stilt homes above a sewage-filled lagoon, changed Mofid's direction. He founded Humanity Effect in 2023.
He launched a GoFundMe campaign aiming to raise $5,000 for a school. More than 200 donors pushed the total past $10,000 in a week. NBA star Kyrie Irving then donated $45,000, funding a water tank, water shoes, a school boat and electricity, according to the Humanity Effect website.
The nonprofit now operates two schools supporting more than 750 students and an orphanage caring for 40 children, the organization's website states.
Upcoming meetings
The Rancho Bernardo Rotary Club meets Thursdays at 16066 Bernardo Heights Parkway, San Diego. The next lunch meeting is Thursday, Oct. 8, with doors opening at 11:15 a.m. and lunch at noon.
