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Good news from Namibia and around the world

LOCAL

Diagnolab donates 100 000 sanitary pads

“We believe that in this day and age, no girl should miss school because of a lack of sanitary pads or access to menstrual hygiene,” Diagnolab chief executive Hambeleleni Matsi said on what motivated National Diagnostic Laboratory to donate. Determined to challenge the taboo surrounding menstruation in some Namibian cultures, Matsi represented Diagnolab at the delivery of 100 000 loose sanitary pads to the Office of the President.

Source: The Namibian

Dr Helena Ndume scoops international awards

Namibian ophthalmologist Dr Helena Ndume was recently awarded the Lions Club International Humanitarian Award and the Forbes Woman Africa Social Impact Award. “This achievement is about teamwork, starting with the overall leadership of the government, in particular the health ministry, that created an enabling environment for the blindness prevention programme,” Ndume said. The Lions Club International Humanitarian Award accolade comes with approximately N$3,7 million which Ndume says will help the national programme fight against preventable blindness through consumables and machinery necessary to carry out operations, as well as sending one of the doctors to specialise in ophthalmology.

Source: The Namibian

Food security and habitat protection project launched

The project is aimed at supporting communities in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA) by maintaining the diverse ecosystem and strengthening its capacity to adapt to climate change. The project is funded by the German federal ministry of economic cooperation and development (BMZ) and will be implemented by World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Germany together with in-country partners. “As part of the Namibian agricultural policy, the government has further set objectives to capacitate farmers with the knowledge, skills and attitude necessary to improve sustainable agricultural production” said Zambezi regional governor Lawrence Sampofu.

Source: The Namibian

Namibia reaches 88% success rate in tuberculosis treatment

In a speech commemorating World Tuberculosis Day, the Minister of Health and Social Services, Kalumbi Shangula, said that Namibia is only 2% short of reaching the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) target treatment success rate. Shangula added that the ministry recorded a decline in the HIV positivity rate amongst TB patients from 60% in 2005 to 30% in 2021. This signifies success in the provision of TB-HIV services and prevention. “These interventions include intensified screening, the introduction of WHO-recommended rapid molecular testing for TB as well as point-of-care TB testing amongst individuals with HIV, all in addition to and the scaling up of shorter-term tuberculosis preventive therapy,” Shangula said.

Source: The Namibian

THE WORLD

The security staff at Baltimore Museum of Art curate their newest exhibition

Guarding the Art is a special exhibition at the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) in Maryland, USA, which engages 17 members from the museum's security team in doing more than just directing visitors to the bathroom. Each member selected three pieces from BMA’s collection of 95,000 artworks that they would like to exhibit. The guards were then tutored how to curate, set lighting and write placards. BMA Chief Curator Asma Naeem said the exhibition asks some profound questions about who is art for? Who are museums for? Who gets to talk about the arts? Who holds the knowledge? Are there other kinds of people who have knowledge about art that we want to be hearing from? And the answer is: Yes, absolutely. Since they are always looking at the art and hear people talk about exhibits, the guards fostered a love, curiosity and knowledge of the art profession to successfully curate an entire exhibition.

Source: Good News Network

Chat checkouts in grocery store to combat loneliness

A Dutch supermarket chain called Jumbo introduced kletskassa (chat checkouts) in 2019 in collaboration with the Netherlands’s Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport. For many people, especially the elderly, grocery shopping is a social outing. As the checkout process becomes more digitised with the introduction of self-checkouts, the kletskassa allows shoppers to take their time and chat with cashiers instead of rushing through the process. It has proved such a great hit among shoppers and staff that Jumbo reportedly plans to add chat checkouts at another 200 stores by the end of 2022.