Guernsey Aids charity receives medical equipment

Equipment donated to a Guernsey Aids charity will be used in a hospital and school in Africa.

The Medical Specialist Group has given a colposcope, which is used to examine the cervix, and a microscope to the Tumaini Fund.

The group was set up by Dr Susan Wilson, to support Aids widows and orphans in Tanzania.

The Tumaini Fund was set up to promote health and education in the country, one of the 10 poorest in the world.

Those in the north west region of the country have an average life-expectancy of just 43 years and one in three mothers deliver babies with HIV.

There are about 200,000 Aids widows and orphans the region and the charity is currently supporting 20,000 orphans.

The colposcope left Guernsey and is currently in a Tumaini Fund container on its way to Tanzania, with the microscope soon to follow.

Dr Wilson said: "Most physics, chemistry and biology lessons are delivered from books, as the schools have no equipment for practical science.

"The children will be very excited to have a microscope and to be able to see tiny things that they have only seen in books or on the blackboard."

Dr Steve Evans, chairman of the Medical Specialist Group, said he was pleased to support the charity's work.
(from BBC)