A Month in the life of The Rotary Club of Becton & District

October 2020

Some Of Our Current Activities.

More Great News Inside

Becton & District Rotary Club; part of Rotary Wessex D1110

Editor– Larry Anthony PHF,

secretary@bectonrotary.org.uk

Welcome to Becton & District Rotary Club. We are a re-formed modern Rotary Club providing potential members with an informal, low cost, flexi-ble and friendly way to be a member of Rotary Interna-tional. We strongly believe in Service Above Self and strive to support local, national and international communities where there is a need. We are firmly committed to equal opportunity for all and strive for a Club that represents the areas we serve. Our door is always open to community minded individuals from any sector of the community who may wish to become members. If you would like further details or a discussion with an existing member then please contact Larry Anthony on the above email. During the current restrictions we are conducting our meet-ings on-line using Zoom; if you feel it would be a benefit to join in one of these meetings this can also be arranged.

OPEN DOOR

Newsletter Of the

Rotary Club of

Becton & District

September 2020 What’s Inside?

Regular.

From Your Editor. Rotary Theme for the

Month. Jimmy’s Corner Birthdays Community Laughter Lines Club Diary And Finally

Features.

Mercy Ships

Home Start Appeal

World Polio Day

PPE Gowns-The Back Story.

New Activity—Basics Bank

NFDIS Sponsorship.

From Your Editor:

October promises to be an interesting month where we will hear of the latest planned arrival in the Mercy Ships fleet, Global Mercy. Linked to this is the an-nouncement by Rotary of the largest Rotary Foundation Global Grant of $1.125 million to be used to equip the Global Mercy with a state of the art CT Scanner and other vital equipment. We offer a welcome to Guest Contributor, Jacki Keable, the CEO of New Forest Disability Information Services, a very worthy local charity making an impact in our area.

In this edition we also have the interesting back-story to the PPE Gowns provided, with our help, by New Forest Sewing for the NHS and Local Community.

We also see the start of a new activity with New Forest Basics Bank ferrying donated food from Waitrose to the NFBB and news of sponsorship of brochures for NF Disability Information Svcs

Recognising the deteriorating situation with the COVID virus we note the Rotary Great Britain and Ireland advice that face to face meetings continue to be suspended.

And finally there is a cornucopia of Covid public information from Hampshire County Council.

October 17th is World Eradication of Poverty Day and provides a stark reminder that half the world’s popu-lation exist on less that $US2.5, which at conversion rates at the time of this article amounts to a mere £1.88,per day. One of our local charities working to support low income areas in Africa is Tools for Self Reliance based at Netley Marsh. Guided by the adage of “Give a man a fish and feed him for a day but teach him how to fish and feed him for a lifetime” the char-ity collects and renovates tools for

shipment to partner organisations in the recipient areas. The tools enable recipients to develop and utilise their skills sufficient to earn a living and in some cases grow sufficiently to enable them to employ others. Further assistance with the cost of setting up a small business can be met by what is known as Micro Financing Initiatives. A typical example of one of these initiatives is Lend With Care run by Care International. These schemes make available a means whereby donors can make loans to entrepreneurs to enable them to work their way out of poverty. Without these schemes those con-cerned would not have access to banking facilities and would have great difficulty in establishing and growing a business that can sustain their families and support their communities. For further information see- Micro Financing— www.lendwithcare.org Tools for Self Reliance https://www.tfsr.org/ World Eradication of Poverty Day- https://www.un.org/en/events/povertyday/

October

Mercy Ships: Rotary Great Britain and Ireland are delighted to an-nounce that the largest Rotary Foundation Global

Grant of $1.125 million has been approved.

This grant will enable Rotary and Mercy Ships to fund a brand new, state of the art CT scanner, and other vital equip-ment onboard the Global Mercy, which launches next year.

The Global Mercy is the largest purpose-built NGO hospital ship. It will double the impact of Mercy Ships on healthcare systems throughout West Africa.

The money will provide a range of sophisticated medical equipment for Decks 3 & 4: the ship’s hospital decks with six operating theatres, three infection isolation rooms, 147 ward beds, six post-operative recovery beds and four intensive care beds. It will also provide training and education for local healthcare workers. Previous text and image provided courtesy of Rotary GB&I, published on https://www.rotarygbi.org/mercy-ships-global-grant/” Many of us will have heard of the amazing work done by the current mercy ship, Africa Mercy, and her predecessors so it is particularly pleasing to know that Global Mercy will be an addition to the fleet rather than a replacement.

Who Is Mercy Ships? Mercy Ships is a faith-based international development organisation that deploys hospital ships to some of the poorest coun-tries in the world, delivering vital, free healthcare to people in desperate need. Mercy Ships works closely with each host nation to improve the way healthcare is de-livered across the country through medical capacity building programs– training and mentoring local medical staff and renovat-ing hospitals and clinics fr use after we complete our field service Since 1978 Mercy Ships has worked in more than 56 countries, providing services valued at over £1.2 billion that have directly helped more than 2.8 million people. We have also trained 43,370 local professionals in their areas of expertise to leave a legacy that exits. Extracted with permission from Mercy Ships Annual Report for 2019

Why Do We Need Them?

Globally, five billion people have no

access to safe and affordable surgery when they need it.

In 1990, Mercy Ships turned their attention to sub-Saharan Africa where nearly 100% of the population lack access to safe affordable and timely surgery. Since then Mercy Ships has con-ducted 47 field services in 13 African countries. Extracted with permission from Mercy Ships Annual Report for 2019

Mercy Ships– A Brief Pictorial History:

Source information courtesy of mercyships.org

Mercy Ships was founded by Don Stephens, pictured right aboard Africa Mercy, and his wife Deyon. His inspiration came from a time when he was part of a Youth Group sheltering from a hurricane in the Bahamas. He heard someone say that they wished a ship could sail in after the hurricane to provide medi-cal care. This concept stayed with him and the challenge grew until he and his wife set everything in motion with the purchase of a decommissioned Italian cruise liner, the MV Victoria.

Following refit and a rename to Anastasis the ship became their flagship from 1978 to 2007

Mercy Ship Anastasis MV Good Samaritan /

Island Mercy

Caribbean Mercy Africa Mercy

In 1983 the Newfoundland Ferry Petite Forte was donated to the charity and for 11 years sailed as the Good Samaritan, serving the Caribbean, Central America, and South America. During that decade-plus, she carried cargo and personnel to the Pan-American games for the U.S. Olympic Committee in 1991, and became the first ship to legally sail between the United States and Cuba in 30 years. In 1994, she underwent extensive renovations, including the addition of onboard operating rooms, and was renamed Island Mercy. She was redeployed to the South Pacific where she served until 2001.

In 1994 the charity acquired the former Norwegian Ferry, ‘Polarlys’ which was refitted and re-named as Caribbean Mercy operating in the Central America and Caribbean Basin until 2006.

In 1999 the charity acquired the then Danish Rail Ferry, MV Dronning. Once refitted and renamed Africa Mercy it became the largest non-governmental Hospital Ship in the world and continues to operate today bringing hope and medical capacity to the sub-Saharan regions of Africa.

NOW– We await the arrival of the Global Mercy to be announced soon and due to enter service in 2021. The ship will be the largest purpose built civilian hospital ship but it is it’s crew, staff and volunteers who will make it into a formidable provider of medical services. God Bless them All.

Home Start Appeal on BBC Radio 4 Reprinted here on behalf of and with kind permission of Homestart Hampshire. You may have heard Kaye Adams on BBC Radio 4 talk-ing about Home-Start as part of the weekly Radio 4 Ap-peal. Thank you to everyone who has already donated to the appeal. If you missed it you can listen back here, , so we hope you get a chance to listen about the life-changing work Home-Start is doing for families such as Mercedes up and down the United Kingdom. Mercedes and her young son, Toby, are just one of the thousands of families in urgent need of support but Home-Start needs your help. Having a baby can be lonely and isolating at the best of times – even with family and friends around supporting you. When parents don’t have this support network during a worldwide pan-demic, the pressures they face can be devastating.

New Forest Sewing for the NHS & Local Community:

PPE– Gowns, The Back Story. Report by Emma McKewan.

The Press Gang and the Cutting Crew were established by volunteers in April 2020 in order to ensure Southampton General Hospital had a supply of gowns for the NHS staff working on the Covid-19 wards at the height of the pandemic. We supplied them with 15,000 gowns before a commercial supplier could be found.

We produced an additional 11,000 gowns for other NHS hospitals, care homes, GP practices, dental practices and the Fire Service, for which we requested donations for charity. All monies raised have been split between a local charity and a £2000 donation to Medecins Sans Fron-

tieres to support their medical teams working around the world.

The Press Gang are a team of over 300 volunteers who have worked from home to heat seal the seams of our Gowns using their domestic irons and package them up for distribution.

Meeting the scale of the task was only possible with help from our friends in the Cutting Crew; our Gowns were generously cut for free by the following companies:

AC Marine & Composites in Gosport Batt Sails in Bosham Dimension Polyant in Fareham Dolphin Sails in Harwich FlexiCovers in Poole FIBRE Mechanics in Lymington MDS Leisure in Lepe Trenchard Aviation in Gatwick Typhoon International in Liverpool Material was donated by ASK Plastics, Cromwell Plastics and Marineware. The project was kindly supported by Sanders Sails, Becton Rotary Club and many more.

More mask tales. A report by Friend of Rotary Phylly Clarke. I heard about the New Forest sewing for NHS project and group through the monthly rotary bulle-tin from the newly formed Becton Rotary Club. My husband Bill was a 42 year member of the New Milton Rotary Club and it was responsible for establishing most of the friendships we still have today.

I duly collected material from Debbie Nottage, instructions from Keith Williams and started on scrub caps, completing about 30. Masks were the next project and I researched online various patterns and sizes and fits. I started to get into a rhythm and was making 10 a day using up all my ‘stash’ of materials often lining them with Bill’s shirts. Like Topsy it grew and I was soon looking for an area to put up a Mask Tree. Our cul de sac was not suitable and I spoke to Carol at Bashley Stores to see is she would be interested in hosting it. We decided that two charities would benefit and people would be asked to donate to either Oakhaven Hospice or Hamp-shire Air Ambulance, both charities already had collection boxes in the store and Carol had contacts so that seemed the easiest op-tion.

About this time I tripped over a tiny tree stump while walking one of our greyhounds and ended up in Lymington A and E with two bro-ken fingers. Cutting out material became a major issue but thankfully my good friend Caroline Sparks (an ex New Milton Rotorac-ter) took over the cutting out and some of the packaging - using the sewing machine with two fin-gers bound up was relatively easy compared to wielding a pair of scissors.

Demand soon started calling the shots, all of my other projects went out of the window. (Thankfully, my main pastime of making greyhound coats is very slow in the summer). I soon ran out of suitable material and started ordering online, it was then that the New Forest Sewing group in conjunction with Becton Rotary offered to supply me as I was making for the community. At the peak of demand we were selling 20 a day at Bashley and I am still supplying Carol with about 15 a week, to date I have made about 700 face coverings in total, some have been given to friends and family but the others have been distributed via the store and the donation system we have been running.

Unfortunately the material has now all been used and I have had to once again order material in-cluding Christmas designs as, one thing is for sure, we will still be wearing Face coverings to do our Christmas shopping.

The total to date, raised by Bashley Stores is £838. for Oakhaven and £932 for Hampshire Air Ambulance. Without the input and inspiration from Gavin Jones of ‘New Forest Sewing for the NHS and the community’, Keith Williams and Debbie Nottage of ‘Becton Rotary Club’ and my good friend Caroline none of this would have happened. Phylly Clarke Lets raise a glass to Phylly and Bashley Stores for this excellent effort...Ed

New Club Activity: The Club has recently commenced a new activity providing support to New Forest Basics Bank by picking up donated food from Waitrose Supermarket in Lymington and transporting it to the Ba-sics Bank location in Lymington. The outline process is volunteers working in pairs pick up empty tote boxes from the Basics Bank and proceed to Waitrose. At Waitrose the boxes are filled with the food generously donated by Waitrose customers. The boxes are then returned to Basics Bank and handed over to the volunteers who use the do-nated food to help with the making up of food parcels for those in need. The emptied boxes are then set to one side to await the next Waitrose run. Currently this activity is conducted twice per week (Monday and Friday) but it is anticipated that at particularly busy times it may increase by the addition of a Wednesday run. Note: If any of our Friends and colleagues wish to assist with this activity they are very welcome to contact Rtn. Adrian Stopps who is coordinating our activity. Initial email contact can be made via secretary@bectonrotary.org.uk .

New Forest Disability Information Service:

New Forest Disability are most grateful to the Rotary Club of Becton and District for their generous sponsor-ship for 5,000 copies of our new brochure. We hope this will be mutually beneficial to both organisations in reach-ing out to people at this very difficult time. Jacki Keable CEO N.F. Disability Information Service

We are pleased to be able to offer a supporting activity to the New Forest Disability Information Service through spon-sorship of their generic brochure which provides the public with information they need to be aware of the range of ser-vices offered by this super charity and further information on how they may be able to access the services. NFDIS is a very worthy charity and makes a positive impact on the well-being of our local community The Club is de-lighted to show our support through the provision of £200 to purchase a print run of 5000 brochures.

https://www.newforestdis.org.uk/

Left: Some of the friendly staff you may en-counter in the Reception of New Forest Disability In-f o r m a t i o n Services.

Did You Know October 24th is World Polio Day?

It has been thirty five years since Rotary committed itself to rid-ding the world of the Wild Polo Virus. At that time the worldwide incidence of this crippling disease was an incredible 1000 cases PER DAY!!!

The commitment shown by Rotary led to the formation of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative GPEI. Initial members were Ro-tary, World Health Organisation, US Centre for Disease Control, UNICEF and the GAVI Vaccine Alliance. These were later joined by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation who claimed it was Ro-tary that inspired them to join the initiative.

The Foundation have been a significant financial asset with their current challenge to Rotary that for any amount raised they will add double the value.

Let’s look at what has been achieved- In 1985 there were 350,000 cases of polio in 125 countries. In 2020 figures released by the Polio Oversight Board show that year to date as of 3rd Sept there have been 102 cases of the Wild Polio Virus in just two countries (Pakistan 65 & Afghanistan 37)

By any stretch of the imagination this is a fight that is being won and saving thousands of children from the effects of this crippling disease.

Well done Rotary for being the inspiration the World needed to confront this disease.

In the meantime there is still much to be done to promote and maintain immunisation programs to ensure that the disease does not reoccur. We should also raise a glass to honour the efforts of the courageous volunteers who continue the fight against Polio under arduous conditions in the remaining countries of Pakistan & Afghanistan.

Image courtesy of Rtn Katie Coard, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

Jimmy’s Corner:

Birthdays During October

Our best wishes go to -

Nil

My garden is under attack! During the day it is quite easy to patrol and, when Debbie and Dave aren’t looking, I chase next door’s cat but I haven’t managed to catch it yet. When it comes to the evening and it is getting dark that is a different matter. My favourite spot is on the window sill behind the settee where I have a view of the front garden and, a couple of weeks ago I noticed a lot of movement so, with a warning bark, I started to rush round the room asking to be let out. All the outside lights went on but Dave and Debbie never saw the dog like creature sneaking round the flower beds. On another evening I was let out into the back garden for my last wander round before turning in for the night, and there was this very strange creature that curled up into a ball and was very prickly. Debbie grabbed me and told me to leave the hedgehog alone – it wasn’t much of a play-mate after all but I still see it coming into the back garden at night!

Jimmy was assisted with this report by Deb-bie Nottage. Above: Ever alert Jimmy monitoring what is

happening in the garden.

Community: These pages are under development and suggestions for future content will be most welcome.

Keable's Column: This month we welcome as our Guest Contribu-tor Jacki Ke-able , Chief Ex-ecutive of New Forest Disability Information Ser-vices in New Milton.

As we find ourselves in our 22nd

year, I think back to the early days of NFDIS and cannot be-lieve how far we have come, how much we have been guided by our clients and in turn been educated ourselves, to better help others. You could have the best information service available but if it is not responding to change and keeping up to date, not just with legislation but with what our clients are asking for, it would not be fit for purpose. I come from a very different background to my current role. Qualifying as a pâtissier, meeting and marrying a lovely man, raising a family, all the usual experiences of life. I was running my own outside catering business when one day I experienced a life changing injury that made my previous occupation unrealistic. Whizzing on some 6 years, I discovered the joys of desk top publishing and was invited to meet with three others to discuss advice (or lack of) for people with disabilities in the New Forest area. A few hours later (and maybe a couple of shandys) and were a steering group for the current char-ity! We opened with two staff totalling 9 hours a week providing free, impartial, confidential, dis-ability related IAG to anyone of any age and their families across the New Forest (helping approx. 300 people per year) …..fast forward two more decades and we now advise approx.

2000 people a year, answering 7,600 enquiries , and last year we secured over £1.5m in welfare benefits for our clients. We have a brilliant spe-cialist team of highly trained staff and wonderful volunteers and help people with anything to do with living with a disability. We particularly spe-cialise in equipment and welfare benefits from new applications, all the way up to representa-tion at welfare benefits tribunal hearings. Along the way we secured the prestigious AQS in gen-eral help with Casework in Welfare Benefits and have held it continuously since 2003. We hope we have been successful in educating some people in the needs and support services required by people living with disabilities; we have informed some 34,000 people over the years and it is not all gloomy, we have held many entertaining fundraising evenings and events along the way plus shared in our clients joy at successful outcomes. I feel very privileged to work with such a dedi-cated and giving Team who have the joy of meeting and advising such lovely people who just happen to be a little less able than others. If this inspires you, please seek out information on becoming a volunteer with New Forest Dis-ability, we would love to hear from you! Jacki Keable Chief Executive

Head Office of New Forest Disability Informa-tion Service in Osborne Road New Milton

https://www.newforestdis.org.uk/

Local Information and COVID Help Groups on Facebook: Hordle Covid19 Help https://www.facebook.com/hordlecovid19help/ Lymington & Pennington Corona Virus Support Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/CoronavirusLymington/

Milford on Sea Covid19 Mutual Aid https://www.facebook.com/groups/210596217016230/

New Milton Covid Support Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/1308875849312554/

We Love Milford on Sea https://www.facebook.com/groups/1561569377488694/

Milford on Sea News https://www.facebook.com/milfordonseanews/

Christchurch, Highcliffe And Mudeford Community https://www.facebook.com/groups/christchurchhighcliffemudefordcommunity/

Becton Rotary on Social Media.

Web: www.bectonrotary.org.uk Facebook: www.facebook.com/bectonrotary Twitter: www.twitter.com/bectonrotary Instagram: www.instagram.com/bectonrotary E-Mail: secretary@bectonrotary.org.uk

We would love to hear from you!

Becton Rotary Club Meetings.

We meet roughly every two weeks and currently these meetings are on-line using Zoom. This means that should you wish to meet us you can do so without leaving the comfort of your home. If you would like an invitation to attend one of our on-line meetings then please contact the Club Sec-retary, Larry on

secretary@bectonrotary.org.uk

Laughter Lines

This month we again see the temporary return of Laughter Lines using material previously pub-lished in www.jokesforfree.com. Images courtesy of Alan Watson at Newmilton.net.

Words To Live By-

Accept that some days you're the pi-geon, and some days you're the statue.

Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them. It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to oth-ers. The early worm gets eaten by the bird, so sleep late. The Second mouse gets the cheese When everything's coming your way, you're in the wrong lane. Birthdays are good for you, the more you have, the longer you live. You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one person.

Trump Is Saved-

One day there were three boys walking down the street, and suddenly they heard cries for help. When the boys got to the noise they saw Donald Trump in a lake drowning. The three boys saved him from drowning. Trump asked the boys how he could ever repay them.

The first boy said, "I want a boat."

The second boy said, "I want a truck."

And the third boy said, "I want three tombstones with our names on them."

Trump asked, "Why is that, son?" The little boy said, "Because when my Dad finds out that we saved you, he is going to kill us all!"

Club Diary: Face to Face meetings are suspended in accordance with the following-

We are aware that some of you who have shown an interest in our activi-ties are particularly keen to attend face to face meetings and events but clearly the deteriorating COVID situation is preventing this. When circum-stances permit we intend to have a social breakfast at The Barn in New Milton when we hope to meet with you all. Thank you for your interest.

Public Information Provided by Hampshire County Council, www.hants.gov.uk.

And Finally:

Artwork with kind permission of Rtn Phil Dyer; FB @rotaryphilip

COVID Advice &Information from Hampshire County Council

The announcement made by the Prime Minister, and now contained in the official Government Guidance, is that the “Rule of Six” is now law and not guidance which is a change to previous Government guidance. The Rule of Six is effective from Monday 14

th September 2020.At its

meeting on 15th September 2020, the Governing Council discussed the subject of clubs (and

districts alike) returning to holding meetings face-to-face. The message from the Governing Council is that until further notice, face-to-face Rotary meetings are not permitted (note:

this also applies to district meetings). Source RotaryGBI, COVID-19 Face to Face Meetings.

And From Rotary-

Keep Hampshire Safe Infographic Data as at 21st September 2020.