By Monique Washington
Educating the various communities within the federation about prevention and control of the mosquito is an initiative that has been rolled out by the Red Cross Society throughout the region.
Roxanne Brookes, Nevis’ Red Cross Branch Director in speaking with Nevispages on Tuesday (March 28) noted that three Red Cross Volunteers in Nevis and three (3) in St. Kitts recently concluded their training in Jamaica and Barbados.
“We now have six (6) specialists who are now trained and ready to support the Government of St. Kitts and Nevis in epidemic control,” she said.
She explained that the program that has rolled out and will end in September of this year. The six (6) Red Cross Volunteers in the Federation that received training were Javier Ottley and Keeliah Warner in Sanitation Hygiene Promotion, Kerdis Clarke and Shanny Reid in Psycho Social Support and Roxanne Brookes and Elric Francis in Epidemic Control .The Program Manager is Patricia Peetes, Red Cross Volunteer in St. Kitts.
This past weekend the three (3) specially trained volunteers facilitated a workshop at the Red Cross Building in Charlestown. Members from the Community Disaster Response Team (CDRT), two (2) Red Cross Volunteers for St. Martin and other Red Cross Volunteers were in attendance.
“A part of the project that we did this weekend was that we go into the communities. The community identified for Nevis is Bath Village which is a concern because of the property of the lands with swamps, proliferation of mosquito breathing ground etc. The overall objectives are educating the communities and to prevent and control the vector which is really the mosquito,” she said.
Brookes noted that mosquitoes are the carrier of many diseases.
“We are now getting all these diseases emerging from the mosquito. The mosquito is a part of us and us as a community and the Red Cross, our objective is to educate the community and support the Ministry of Health in preventing or reducing the impact of all these emerging diseases,” she concluded.
As part of the program there will also be a cleanup campaign in the Bath Village area amongst other selected communities in St. Kitts and Nevis , but no date has been set as yet.
