29/05/2003

Incubators Donated to Maputo Central Hospital

The Italian religious body, the Santo Egidio Community, on Thursday donated equipment worth 40,000 euros (about 48,000 US dollars) to Maputo Central Hospital.

The donation includes two incubators for babies born prematurely.

Immediately after the ceremony at which the equipment was delivered, the director of the hospital's paediatrics department, Clementina Antonio, told reporters that this donation is a response to the Health Ministry's efforts to seek from its cooperation partners solutions leading to improving care for the public.

"This material will reduce the enormous difficulties that we face in dealing with new-born infants", said Antonio. "This is a major contribution to caring for babies who are born prematurely".

The representative of the Santo Egidio Community pledged that his organisation is always willing to support the Mozambican health sector.

"This is not the first time we have assisted the central hospital", she said. "We do this because we think we are helping to save lives".

This organisation has also been working with the Health Ministry and the hospital in programmes to assist people living with AIDS, notably through the provision of anti-retroviral drugs.

There is a longstanding relationship between the Santo Egidio Community and Mozambique. It was the Community that hosted, and provided mediators, for the 1990-1992 peace talks between the Mozambican government and the apartheid-backed Renamo rebels.