The New Zealand government has made a contribution of $700,000 to the Fiji Red Cross Society (FRCS) to support its pandemic response plans and improve its medical services amid rising cases of COVID-19, FRCS said on Friday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 10th September, 2021) The New Zealand government has made a contribution of $700,000 to the Fiji Red Cross Society (FRCS) to support its pandemic response plans and improve its medical services amid rising cases of COVID-19, FRCS said on Friday.
"The New Zealand Government has announced a contribution of FJ$1.45million to the Fiji Red Cross Society's (FRCS) COVID-19 response plans," FRCS said in a release.
An estimated 240 new cases of COVID-19 have been reported over the last 24 hours in the archipelago nation.
"The funding will enable FRCS to divert more resources towards supporting the Ministry of Health and Medical Service with its vaccine rollout, blood donations, and training of volunteers for community surveillance and home-based care," New Zealand's High Commissioner to Fiji, Jonathan Curr, said in the release.
The funding would help the charity organization deploy more volunteers to join the existing 200-strong force to support the vaccination campaign.
FRCS currently assists with screening, registering, and verification processes, also pledging to transport pregnant women and highly vulnerable people to vaccination centers upon request by the Health Ministry.
"Another key area that this funding will support is FRCS's work on blood donations," Curr said, adding that "more resources will be dedicated towards accessing safe blood and blood products by recruiting geographical clusters of blood donors and providing transport assistance to them to speed up the donation process and make it as safe and easy as possible."
With an increased rate of infections, Fiji, an archipelago of over 300 islands, has vaccinated 33.70% of its population of circa 890,000.
