Fighting Disease

Kent Rotarians provide defibrillator to shopping centre

Kent Rotarians provide defibrillator to shopping centre

Rotarians in Kent have been working on a two-pronged community initiative to support the health of their local community.

The last six months have been testing times for everyone.

At Erith Rotary in Kent they, like other Rotary clubs, had to suspend their weekly meetings and move into a virtual world to maintain contact.

“One thing that didn’t change, was our resolve to support the local community,” explained Erith Rotarian, Dave Cook.

“Using funds raised and contributions from individual members, we were delighted to sponsor two major projects.”

The first was to present the Erith Riverside Shopping Centrwith a defibrillator. “If it just saves one life, it will be well worth the investment,” added Dave.

At Erith Rotary in Kent they, like other Rotary clubs, had to suspend their weekly meetings and move into a virtual world to maintain contact.”

Erith Rotary’s second project was to raise funds to support their local branch of the St John’s Ambulance Brigade and present them with ten new radios to replace their ageing equipment.

kent rotary defibrillator

Erith Rotary’s second project was to raise funds to support their local branch of the St John’s Ambulance Brigade and present them with ten new radios to replace their ageing equipment.

Both of these were presented in a very brief ceremony at the Erith Riverside Shopping Centre by Erith Rotary President Keith Wisdom, to Ryan Casey who manages the Shopping Centre and Dean Gardiner who leads the Erith St. John’s Ambulance Brigade

“This was a two-pronged attack to help the health of the nation, or at least our community,” added Dave.

“Like most clubs, we have taken to Zoom to maintain our fellowship and at the same time, continue with our work to serve the local community. It was through this medium that we came up with these two ideas.”

Meanwhile, in Hampshire, Fordingbridge Rotary managed to stage a socially-distanced boules competition at the Sandy Balls Holiday Village in Godshill.

If it just saves one life, it will be well worth the investment.”

Fordingbridge Rotary has recently benefited from a new committee and President. The photograph depicts Toni Butler, the new President, casting an eye over the proceedings.

Toni has made her mark by making a few changes. In line with the Rotary mantra ‘service before self’, Fordingbridge Rotary is seeking ways of further assisting the local community.

In the recent past, it has undertaken such projects as the Rotary Young Musician competition, supporting ‘Dictionaries for Life’, and the Christmas lights initiative.

Rather than being run by a set of committees, which is turning out to be difficult in this present pandemic era, Fordingbridge Rotary is now hoping to be ‘project-led’, and is actively seeking new projects from within the Fordingbridge area.