
SIPOKUHLE Community Development for Intellectually Impaired and Disabled people received funding to train 10 volunteers in a first aid and basic home care course at St John Ambulance centre.
Daily Dispatch Local Hero finalist Sithembile Dluthu, a special needs teacher, said first aid and basic home care were skill needed by the intellectually impaired and disabled.
Dluthu runs a vegetable garden on an open piece of land in Reservoir Road, veggies are sold to shops and restaurants with funds going to the needy and disabled people.
”I started this organisation due to the fact that there was an open piece of land behind my house in Belgravia and it was merely a hub of crime and wrongdoing. So I decided to turn it into something productive and start an organic vegetable garden and recruit intellectual impaired disabled people and teach them how to start and grow their own organic gardens,” Dluthu said.
When St John Ambulance was asked to assist with what they could help with, instead of donation to help fund one person, they identified 10 people from the organisation and offered them a full first aid and basic home care course.
“What I also realised was that intellectually challenged doesn’t only mean mentally challenged, it means that they could be suffering from epilepsy and they might not be able to read the signs before they have a fit. That is why it is important for them to learn the basics of first aid and home based care,” St John centre manager, Annie Parkin, said.
When the GO! & Express visited the centre recently, the group was busy with their practical assessments. They will receive certificates and will be the first group of intellectually impaired and disabled persons to have received certificates for first aid and basic home care in East London.