Major Health initiative at Isaac Newton

MH internal glazingA new medical house will be opened at Isaac Newton High School, Katera in time for the 2014 school year. The picture shows workmen glazing the internal windows of one of the two wards.

The house contains treatment and dispensing rooms and two twin-bedded wards to cater for students who need to be cared for in isolation.

A newly qualified nurse will work full-time to provide care and treatment and to coordinate health education in the school and local community.

No longer will sick students have to be sent home to be cared for when they have malaria or upper respiratory infections. The nurse will work under the supervision of doctors in a local health centre. It will mean that simple wounds and infections will be able to be treated within the school.

The medical house has been adopted by the Local Health Department and the Ministry of Health and will be used as an immunisation centre for the school and local community. It will also be used as a centre for health education in the school and local area. So education initiatives on T.B., HIV/AIDS, Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs) and parasitic diseases will be run from the new facility.

World Bank workers have provided drums and costumes to a student health group, which is being trained up to perform health campaign songs and dances within school and in local villages.

A full account of developments at the school can be read in the November 2013 Report on Isaac Newton High School, Katera.