CARE Bangladesh Health Access and Linkage Opportunities for Workers Plus (HALOW+) project provided healthcare providers in Gazipur, including doctors, 100 sets of personal protective equipment (PPE) in Gazipur. There was a simple ceremony organized in this regard where Mohammad Zahangir Alam, Mayor of Gazipur City Corporation attended as chief guest on April 6, 2020. Apart from PPE, disposable hand gloves, mask, hand sanitizer, liquid soap, hand rubs were provided for distribution among various communities in Gazipur.
“I thank CARE Bangladesh for coming forward in the midst of the COVID-19 outbreak. To tackle the novel corona virus, medical personnel and essential service providers must use PPE, but due to the global pandemic, the equipment is scarce”- Mohammad Zahangir Alam, Mayor of Gazipur City Corporation said. Senior officials from Gazipur City Corporation and representatives from health departments were present in the ceremony.
“Care Bangladesh is closely working with Bangladesh government in development and humanitarian sector where in need. In response to COVID-19, government has taken a lot of initiatives to tackle the crisis and. CARE Bangladesh with its limited resource is very happy to join in providing PPE and Hygiene kits in order to support ongoing initiatives of the Gazipur City Corporation”- said Dr. Ikhtiar Uddin Khandaker, Director-Health Program of CARE Bangladesh. He added that coordinated and collaborative efforts will strengthen our response to COBID-19 in Bangladesh specially in Gazipur.
With the financial support from GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Marks & Spencer (M&S); HALOW+ is strengthening the learning of the pilot project that was carried out in 2015. The pilot project focused on four key areas of interventions, aimed at improving health care access for Ready-Made Garment (RMG) workers and improve their health and nutrition-seeking behavior; increasing preventative and curative service uptake by RMG workers; mobilizing communities and creating referral networks and service linkage for RMG workers and their families and creating shared platforms to address underlying health and nutritional issues faced by workers.
In coordination with Ready-Made Garment (RMG) factory management, HALOW+ project undertook a number of awareness-raising activities among workers at the factory level on COVID-19. Major activities included demonstration on hand washing practices and installing of tap system by bottle for the washing purpose. Hand wash dangler/PVC Poster was used in the session. A total of 558 RMG workers were oriented at the factory level while 61 community people attended session on COVID-19 and hand-washing system in Dhaka, Gazipur and Mymensingh.
