While the number of Covid-19 positive cases in the Eastern Cape is currently showing a sharp incline, provincial hospitals battle to keep up with the demand for personal protective equipment (PPE).
As part of its Covid-19 relief effort, the humanitarian organisation, Gift of the Givers, donated PPE and other essential hospital supplies to the value of R80 000 and R250 000 respectively to Uitenhage and Livingstone hospitals last Thursday.
Doctors, pharmacists and nursing staff at the hospitals enthusiastically welcomed the Gift of the Givers’ team who drove from Graaff-Reinet to deliver the much needed surgical gloves and masks, sanitisers, theatre gowns, and other items like visors, infrared thermometers and oxypulse metres to assist frontline staff to effectively monitor the oxygen level and heart rate of Covid-19 patients.
Three brand new perspex intuboxes, that minimise the possible spread of the virus and protect medical staff when a patient has to undergo an intubation procedure, were also donated to Livingstone Hospital.
According to Gift of the Givers founder, Dr Imtiaz Sooliman, the foundation has funded six nurses to assist the Nelson Mandela Bay health cluster with Covid-19 testing.
“We will continue to intensively support and intervene in communities in the Eastern Cape during the Covid-19 lockdown.
“We are passionate about supporting frontline workers in the province, and have been distributing PPE to clinics, hospitals and the South African Police Services from rural Covid-19 hotspot Middelburg, to East London and even remote areas like the Tafalofefe hospital near Butterworth.”
As part of the organisation’s formal Covid-19 relief effort in the Eastern Cape, 6 000 food parcels have been delivered to vulnerable households all over the province, while a further 2 000 will be distributed in the following week.
For many households, this has been the first food relief they have received since the beginning of lockdown on March 26.
To date, the humanitarian organisation has spent more than R5 million on relief efforts in the province, but the organisation is quick to acknowledge the Spirit of Ubuntu from the South African public.
Corene Conradie, coordinator for Gift of the Givers in the Eastern Cape, said, “We are sincerely grateful for the financial and practical support we continue to receive from ordinary South Africans, as well as corporate donors, despite the devastating effects of lockdown on the economy.
“The spirit of Ubuntu might still prove to be the most effective medicine against the coronavirus.”
