Rotary Club of Marlow
EBOLA - News Letter - 20th February 2018
Congratulations
In August 2014 the Rotary Club of Marlow responded to the Ebola crisis in West Africa and formed a
partnership with the Rotary Club of Monrovia to supply immediate aid. Nearly £100,000 was raised
in the UK along with funds from Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, the USA and other countries.
To date we have funded immediate aid during the crisis, supported an education and sanitation
campaign, which we believe actively shortened the epidemic by many months. When the crisis
appeared to be under control, we started the legacy campaign to deal with the post Ebola situation,
with aid to the medical sector, we are now in the second year of a scholarship program to train
young health professionals to try and fill some of the gaps in the health system - due to deaths from
Ebola - and now we have just started to build our new oxygen concentrator at the ELWA hospital in
Monrovia.
It had been planned to commission an oxygen concentrator plant in England and ship it out in a
container. The Rotary Club of Monrovia were approached by the ELWA hospital in Monrovia, they
were looking for an oxygen concentrator and were hoping Rotary could help. The ELWA hospital is a
new build in Monrovia and is sponsored by a USA based 'Missionary' charity, this means that the
'American' influence will be very strong maintaining standard of care. There were many attractions
to the partnership; the new hospital will be the first in Liberia offering piped oxygen to the
emergency rooms and the operating theatre. ELWA operates in various parts of Africa and has good
and reliable technical support for plant and equipment; this has reduced our costs while ensuring a
strong technical support for the plant for the foreseeable future, and because this is a new build the
plant room will be built to the highest standards. As with the previous application, there will be a
considerable amount of surplus oxygen which will be distributed to other State hospitals in Monrovia.
ROTARY IS GOOD
District Governor of District 9101 with the Assistant Governor of Liberia, Nadu Cooper, the Rotary Club
of Monrovia's President N. Oswald Tweh and students of the Mother Pattern School of Health
Science who were awarded scholarship to study Nursing, Laboratory Technology and Physician
Assistant.
The Scholarship is a Post Ebola initiative sponsored through a grant from Rotary International, the
Rotary Club of Marlow/ UK and from funds generated by the Rotary Club of Monrovia.
'During the Ebola epidemic, many medical and para medical personnel died as a result of many of
them contracting the Ebola Virus, while carrying out their duties in caring for those who were affected
by the Ebola Virus.
This Post Ebola Initiative is to assist deserving students facing financial constraints while perusing
their dreams to care for the sick.
Before we could make the grant application, we needed to raise a little money and also confirm that
the Districts that had originally offered funds (DDF) were still in place. December saw us preparing
the grant application. To our delight, London District 1130 - who were not in the original application
agreed to offer us DDF. In all, we had District contributions from 1090, Thames Valley 1060,
Birmingham and the West Midlands, 1175 South West and 1130 London.
The Global Grant application for just under $200,000 was submitted on 3rd January 2018 and
APPROVED by Rl on the 18th January - is this a record??
Funds have been moved to Monrovia and we are expecting the Rl contribution to arrive within the
next day or so, and we will then be in a position to start placing orders.
Peter Ballard (District grants 1090) discusses the workings of an Oxygen concentrator.
WHAT A WAY TO START THE YEAR. Thank you all on behalf of the people of Monrovia who will
benefit from the work of the Rotary Club of Monrovia.
We still need funds to continue supporting the work of the Rotary Club of Monrovia, as they
continue to work within the health sector to improve the lives of others.
ROTARY:
MAKING A
DIFFERENCE
Yours in Rotary Brian Jonson
Rotary Club of Marlow