The Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference (GCBC) has made a cheque donation of GHS70,000.00 to the COVID-19 National Trust Fund.
Most Reverend Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle, Metropolitan Archbishop of Cape Coast who is the Vice President of GCBC, made the presentation on behalf of the Conference at its Secretariat in Accra.
He was supported by Rev. Fr. Lazarus Anondee, Secretary-General of the GCBC.
Archbishop Palmer-Buckle noted that the donation was the Catholic Church’s widow’s mite to support the government so that collectively Ghana could fight the novel Coronavirus disease.
He said GCBC’s nine-month National Response Plan for Covid-19 is aimed at providing Protective Personal Equipment for all Catholic frontline health workers as well as provide relief items to the elderly and the vulnerable.
He expressed his gratitude to all, especially the frontline workers for their sacrifices and prayed for God’s protection and intervention.
Mr. Jude Kofi Bucknor, a Member the Board of Trustees, received the cheque on behalf of the Trust.
He was supported by the Administrator of the Fund, Dr. Collins Asare.
Mr. Bucknor thanked the Catholic Church on behalf of the Trustees for the generous donation and gave the assurance that the money would be used judiciously and accounted for by the Trust.
Meanwhile, the Conference says it is equipping all of its 111 hospitals across the country and putting them on alert to attend to any case of COVID-19.
It says it has trained its nurses and doctors in the hospitals and provided them with Personal Protective Equipment to fight the pandemic.
Speaking to Citi News, Vice President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference, Reverend Father Charles Palmer-Buckle with all stakeholders coming together, COVID-19 will soon be defeated.
“In the Catholic church we have about 111 hospitals all over the country, including clinics and health centres and they have all got a certain preparedness for this COVID-19 and they are doing what they can. In most of our hospitals which are in the rural areas they also have what we call emergency preparedness plan where they have food, and medication, and we are donating PPEs among other things for them to reach the poor and simple people. We are following the footsteps of Pope Francis who himself instituted a COVID support fund and donated $750,000 into it,” he said.
