Our Correspondent
Badin
Oxfam has been engaging with local partners to actively respond to the COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan, as part of its ongoing response, Oxfam has initiated a distribution drive of hygiene kits in the province of Sindh. In partnership with Management and Development Foundation (MDF), kits will be distributed amongst families belonging to low-income farming communities in Hyderabad, Tando Mohammed Khan and Badin Districts, said a press release issued from Islamabad said.
The beneficiaries of the distribution drive include women-led households that have continued working in the fields as Covid-19 continues to spread in the country. These frontline farmer families are in much need of safety kits and PPEs so that they can carry out essential work without contracting the disease. Uzma Aftab, Country Director of Oxfam in Pakistan appreciated the distribution drive. ‘It is incredibly important that we protect our food frontliners and farming community as they are working in these unprecedented circumstances without adequate protection against COVID-19,’ she remarked.
‘While many of us were living in the safety of a lockdown, our female food frontliners have been at the forefront of this pandemic, risking their lives to put food on our tables. Reaching out to them and providing them with hygiene kits and PPEs during this time is imperative,’ she added. Oxfam in Pakistan is working to offer comprehensive and safe support to poor, vulnerable and marginalized people to help prevent the spread of coronavirus and to protect them from the impact of emergency measures taken to control and respond to the pandemic.
The week-long distribution drive will cover 37 villages in three districts, Hyderabad, Tando Mohammed Khan and Badin to distribute 1,400 hygiene kits. So far, 980 hygiene kits have been distributed. Each hygiene kit included a jerry bucket, eight soaps, ten face masks, a pack of mosquito repellent coils and educational flyers. During the distributions, MDF also conducted awareness sessions on government-issued SOPs, including safe distancing, proper handwashing techniques and the importance of wearing face masks.
