By Bennie Mundando
The Zambia Red Cross in partnership with Coca Cola Foundation has pumped more support towards the prevention and control of COVID-19 in Zambia working with the Ministry Of Community Development and Social Services.
As part of their ongoing mask up and stay safe campaign, the two organisations have so far donated 120 face masks to Matero After Care, 202 face masks to Zambia Agency for Persons with Disabilities and 20,000 reusable face masks to Ministry of Community Development and social services distributed to priority districts.
Additionally, they have donated six foot handwashing station to Intercity Bus terminus Clinic, Chipata Level One Hospital, Home of David and Faith, Kamwala South, UTH and Richard Allen Community School, Chilenje. They have also distributed 4,900 to the Coca-cola districts and 684 bottles of hand sanitizer.
This is part of their ongoing campaign to render COVID-19 support worthy US$50 000, to six districts identified by government as hot spot areas. These include Mansa, Chiengi, Nsumbu, Nchelenge, Kasama and Lusaka.
According to Coca Cola Foundation, the aim of the grant is to educate up to 1 million Zambians to take preventative measures against exposure to the COVID-19 virus to prevent illness and death.
“We have carried out community sensitization in all the districts. This has been with the support from the Ministry of Health to ensure consistent countrywide messaging.
The response has been a mixture of various feelings. People in the communities are grateful for this support and have welcomed the consistent messaging that is being made available. However, there are some who still believe the pandemic is not real and simply a global hoax.
There is need for more inclusive messaging and engagement in the various languages and for the differently abled,” said Zambia Red Cross.
