Difficult-to-access and failing public healthcare services in Gauteng have prompted a local service organization to seek assistance for marginalized communities.
Ashraful Aid has been sustaining the needs of communities for more than 27 years and provides its assistance packages across more than 30 countries. It currently operates numerous projects in Gauteng, providing essential amenities such as food, water, education, shelter, and other vital necessities to individuals in need. As part of Ashraful Aid’s ongoing work in the province, particularly in Johannesburg and surrounding areas, it has encountered many communities unable to easily access primary healthcare services.
The organization quickly identified a need to provide basic healthcare services to marginalized communities by offering accessible, reliable, cost-effective, and regular healthcare services within these communities. Unfortunately, it was unable to fund the necessary intervention until recently when the South African Muslim Charitable Trust (SAMCT) stepped in, providing an especially converted vehicle, valued at R1 210 000, to operate as a mobile health clinic.
Commenting on its vehicle donation, SAMCT representative Mr. Gaff Osman said: “Public health facilities in the province are simply unable to meet requirements, the consequence of a lack of sufficient facilities, among other issues, leaving many without access to basic healthcare and medication without incurring expensive travel costs, long waiting times, and poor medical service.”
Gauteng is South Africa’s most densely populated province and faces a regular influx of people from within the country and neighboring states in search of work and other income-earning opportunities.
Mr. Osman added: “Ashraful Aid believed that the most cost-effective and sustainable intervention to help meet the healthcare needs of disadvantaged communities here would be to provide a mobile healthcare solution. However, the required capital expenditure exceeded the financial capabilities of the organization. Their plight prompted the SAMCT to act, offering an appropriately converted vehicle to enable the organization to deploy basic healthcare services, supplementing and enhancing the assistance it already provides, such as food relief, skills development, and other developmental initiatives, within these communities.”
He believed the introduction of a mobile primary health clinic would have a significant impact on marginalized communities in the region, including increased affordable, timely, and convenient access to healthcare, the delivery of preventive care and health education, chronic disease management, emergency and urgent care, and more effective community engagement and trust.
The SAMCT was created in 2008, the result of a partnership between Old Mutual Unit Trusts and Al Baraka Bank for the creation, marketing, and distribution of a suite of Shariah Funds. The organization provides funding, services, and other resources for the improvement of the lives of the vulnerable, deprived, and disadvantaged. It has been singularly successful in delivering sizeable assistance solutions throughout South Africa, irrespective of race or religion, and continues to work to support needy organizations in the fields of healthcare, social development, poverty alleviation, and education.
Ashraful Aid extends its services to a range of establishments, including homes for the elderly, children, and more, with the overarching goal of improving the well-being of local communities.
Now, its new mobile primary healthcare service will initially provide basic screening and primary healthcare services on a fortnightly rotational basis to at least 10 identified communities, extending healthcare reach to well over 3,000 people.
Mr. Osman concluded: “We, of the SAMCT, are proud and privileged to have formed a collaborative partnership with Ashraful Aid through the provision of this mobile health clinic vehicle and believe the intervention will greatly enhance the quality of life of many communities who have previously been unable to easily access basic healthcare. By now being in the position to take healthcare to the people, Ashraful Aid has been empowered to contribute towards better health outcomes, improved quality of life, and the overall well-being of Gauteng’s rural population.”
Ends
For more information about the SAMCT or its Ashraful Aid mobile health clinic vehicle donation, for provision to the Roshnee Team in Johannesburg, please contact:
Rasheeda Motala
Social Responsibility Officer
Tel: 084 506 2280
Email: samct@samct.co.za