Airtel spearheads health screening for deaf students

Airtel Ghana limited has provided eye screening for 350 students of the Mampong Senior/Technical High School for the Deaf in the eastern region. And as part of Airtel Ghana’s social responsibility had at the beginning of the year assisted the school with GH¢14,000.00 to defray rent arrears.

The eye screening is line with the UN Convention on rights of persons with disability which demands “the provision of same range, quality and standard of free or affordable health care and programmes as provided to persons without disabilities.”

Ms Lucy Quist, Managing Director of Airtel Ghana said: “We believe in the intervention, which Airtel Ghana believes will go a long way to ensure that sights are saved and refractive errors corrected.”

She said the company believed in harnessing the power of every student’s potential towards national development, regardless of the challenges they faced. Airtel has adopted the school and would continue to offer assistance to it and the students to realize their full potential towards social and economic transformation, she added.

According to Ms Quist, about 285 million people are estimated to be visually impaired worldwide and approximately 90 per cent of the world’s visually impaired persons live in developing countries.

She said globally, uncorrected refractive errors are the main cause of visual impairment while cataracts remain the leading cause of blindness in middle- and low-income countries like Ghana. However, 80 per cent of all visual impairment can be avoided or cured.

Ms Quist said at Airtel: “we are committed to making a difference to…communities through both funding and…individual participation to make a change.” Head of Corporate Communications and CSR, Donald Gwira reiterated that the Airtel would continue to support the school and every way possible.

He told school authorities: “your school has been adopted by Airtel as part of our school adoption programme,” and would work closely with government to take up full responsibility of the school.

Last year, Airtel Ghana moved to safe the Mampong Senior/Technical High School for the Deaf, after the landlord threatened it with eviction notice, for failing to pay GH¢14,000.00 rent areas.

The company, in early this year, donated a 15KVA generator to the school and helped pay medical bills of a sick student. During the screening, students with severe eye cases were referred to the Mampong Hospital for further assessment with Airtel pledging to bear the full cost of all medicated spectacles and lens prescribed for students and teachers.