Prudential Bank Limited has donated ¢100,000.00 to the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research (NMIMR) as part of the Bank’s support for the Ghana’s fight against Covid-19.
The NMIMR is the institution spearheading Ghana’s efforts to curtail the spread of Covid-19. The Institute has been given the task to carry out testing, contact tracing and diagnostic confirmation of the disease.
Managing Director of the Bank, Mr. John Addo said that the donation is in recognition of NMIMR’s crucial role in the fight against the pandemic and to augment the institute to discharge its mandate effectively.
In addition to this donation to Noguchi, he indicated that the Bank has made donations to the Ghana Bankers Association, COVID Trust Fund, and some other important institutions mandated to combat the spread of the disease.
According to him, the Bank has supported the country with over ¢1 million so far in the fight against the pandemic.
Mr. Theodore Ahuno, Administrator, NMIMR receiving the cheque expressed appreciation to the Bank for the support. He said the Institution needed such support in the fight against the disease.
When Ghana started witnessing significant community spread of the virus, officials of Noguchi came out to solicit for support from the general public.
mPharma Pharmaceutical Services Company and MTN Ghana Limited were some of the organisations that assisted the Institute during the early period of the outbreak in the country.
mPharma presented a mobile COVID-19 testing equipment (Molecular workstation) to NMIMR. This Molecular workstation was to help the Institute to rapidly test samples of COVID-19 suspected cases in remote areas or places farther from the Institute.
Prof. Abraham Anang received the equipment on behalf of the Institute and made it clear that the device was of utmost importance to the Institute’s activities and Ghana’s fight against COVID-19.
Mr. Gregory Rockson, CEO and Co-founder of mPharma said; “it became essential for mPharma to donate the molecular workstation to the Institute to enable its health workers to test while on the field taking samples. We believe that the way for us to continue to have a handle on this pandemic is for us to boost the testing capacity in the country. So working with our partners, we are donating today, a portable molecular workstation.”
The company also provided reagents to enable the Institute test for testing of 1000 people using the device.
MTN Ghana on the other hand gave Noguchi technological gadgets that would make the institute’s operations more fluid in the country’s fight against the deadly coronavirus.
Through the leading teleco’s MTN Ghana Foundation, Noguchi received five HP laptops with accessories, two printers [black and white plus a colored one], a server to be used for storing massive data, as well as two Lenovo desktops.
The Corporate Services Executive at MTN Mr. Samuel Koranteng, during that donation explained that the ¢42,000 worth of equipment was to assist the institute in its operations.
“We realized that in donating the items they requested, we would assist in their testing, their storage of data and various health processes to help in the speed in which they work and the speed with which they are able to deliver test results”, he stressed.
The NMIMR, he said was set up in 1979 as a semi-autonomous institute of the University and is the leading biomedical research facility in Ghana.
The Institute was built by the Government of Japan and donated to the Government and people of Ghana in honour of the distinguished Japanese researcher, Dr. Hideyo Noguchi, who researched into yellow fever in Ghana and died from the disease in the country in 1928.
