The impact of the coronavirus has extended far beyond those who have become infected. Entire communities face emergency measures, and for the Republic of Congo, the entire population was under home confinement from 31 March to 15 May 2020 in an attempt to prevent further spread of the disease. This year, the risk of Covid-19 infection has lowered in the country. As of 16 March 2022, there were 24,049 confirmed cases, 20,178 recoveries, 3,493 active cases and 378 confirmed deaths. The Congolese air borders opened on August 24, 2020 for international flights. International air carriers have resumed some services into and from Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire. Land and river borders reopened. Places of worship, schools, restaurants and bars were reopened.
New Sight has been working in the Republic of Congo to prevent and reverse causes of blindness for the past 10 years through non-profit eye services, first in Impfondo, and now in the town of Ouesso. Around 30-50% of the population live under the United Nation’s definition of Absolute Poverty, and the unemployment rate is among the highest in the world. We have witnessed that by helping people regain their sight, quality of daily living can drastically improve for them, their families and the wider community. However, during the height of the threat of Covid-19, the community was under-equipped in awareness, knowledge and resources. New Sight did not stand by and must do what we can to help, even though the task was larger than our capacity as an eye care charity.
Our team, along with our students, have initiated health education efforts by disseminating information through leaflets, posters, seminars, radio interviews, phone messaging and social media online. All the resources produced by New Sight are available for free and have been used not just to help our local community, but throughout Congo and even other African countries. In the same way that we partner with the Ministry of Health and local authorities in our eye work, we are working closely with the local health department officials and community leaders during the challenging time.
We will continue our health education efforts, assist local health departments and seek to provide sanitising or medical supplies to the neediest among us. Please consider giving to this special fund set apart for Covid-19 relief of people in Congo. We do have hope and faith that Congo will weather this Covid-19 outbreak. Any remainder from this fund will be set aside for special projects in community health.
To date, we've raised HKD$648,272.87 so far for the Covid-19 relief campaign.
Cheques/Bank Transfer/FPS: Please select “Offline Donation” in the form below and indicate “Covid-19 relief” in the reference/message of your donation submission so that your donation will go toward this fund.
Credit card: Please select “Credit Card” in the form below and fill it in, then your donation will go toward to this fund. A fee of between 2.9-3.4% will be deducted by our payment processing provider, and the net proceeds will go toward this fund.