Health Ministry receives significant endowment from religious body

Sep 11, 2008 News

---

More wheelchairs available to persons with disabilities

To aid its quest of ensuring that each citizen in need of a wheelchair gets one, the Ministry of Health was yesterday endowed with a quantity of much needed wheelchairs, valued at more than $4M, from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a religious denomination.
The presentation was made at the Health Ministry’s Materials Management Unit (MMU), situated at Mudflat, Kingston, Georgetown.
In presenting the donation to the Health Minister, Second Councillor of the Guyana Branch of the church, Mr Kenrick Benn, pointed out that the donation is not the first and would not be the last, since the religious body is always willing and available to assist.
According to Minister of Health, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy, the endowment is not only substantial but it is significant to the Ministry of Health.
He disclosed that the Ministry has over the years been able to benefit in many ways from the gestures of the church, which he noted resulted from a partnership which has been in existence for some years.
“Throughout my term as Minister this sector has benefited from the partnership with the church…There are several programmes we have been engaged in and one of the encouraging parts for me is that every time the church goes out and adds to the contribution of the sector, instead of having just a simple thank you they get a further request from the Minister,” the Minister fondly recounted.
And like the religious body, the Minister said that the Ministry has also been receiving similar assistance from the Food for the Poor (Guyana) Incorporated.
The assistance from the two entities has been sought, according to the Minister, to ensure that “no Guyanese who needs a wheelchair must be without a wheelchair.”
But in the initial part of the programme to furnish persons with a wheelchair, the Minister noted that “a wheelchair was a wheelchair” pointing out that it did not at the time matter what kind of wheelchair was handed out.
“You saw sometimes some really big adults trying to fit into some small wheelchairs and sometimes a very small child trying to manoeuvre in a big wheelchair. In the early days, our priority was simply to get a wheelchair to somebody who needed and any wheelchair would make some difference in their lives.”
The Minister noted that it was through attempts to look at quality in the sector that the type of wheelchairs available for distribution was closely examined.
As such he explained that efforts were made to create conditions to ensure that persons in need of wheelchairs are afforded the correct type.
“In this donation we have five different types of wheelchairs…so our programme is advancing. I have repeated many, many times that we probably need about US$140 per capita to provide good health care for our people…The government’s budget ensures that we get about US$80 per capita so we are still short… to provide our people with a quality comprehensive health care.”
But according to the Minister, the public health sector is now able to provide the appropriate service through partnership.
He particularly lauded Elder and Sister Tanner of the church who, he noted, have been very instrumental in the partnership.
The donation of 250 wheelchairs will be made available to the public through the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.
The cost of acquiring each wheelchair, according to Elder Tanner, amounted to about US$85, and they were shipped to Guyana and delivered to the MMU at the expense of the church.
Minister Ramsammy noted that while the donation is indeed significant, it still is not sufficient for the Ministry to fulfil its promise of ensuring that everyone in need receives a wheelchair.
For this reason, he expressed optimism that the partnership would grow and that the Health Ministry, working along with the Human Services Ministry, will ensure that wherever people live in Guyana they will be afforded a wheelchair if the need arises.
And even as the donation ceremony came to an end, the Health Minister decided to put in another request for assistance. According to him, the Disability Commission has been working with the Ministry in order to establish a register. He disclosed that a major part, which represents the Georgetown area, has already been completed, since it is expected that from October 1 people living with disabilities in the city will benefit from transportation provided by the Ministry for their regular hospital appointments.
In light of this, the Minister said that he would be grateful if the Church would join the venture by providing a suitable type of bus which could serve to transport persons with disabilities.

---

---