STILL High Lift Pallet Truck helps Children in Need
STILL donates high lift pallet truck to ARCHEMED - Doctors for Children in Need e.V.
STILL’s Dortmund branch decided to give a “Christmas present” this year by donating a truck to ARCHEMED – Doctors for Children in Need. This non-profit association provides medical humanitarian assistance for sick children and expectant mothers in Eritrea, one of the world’s poorest countries.
The association operates a warehouse in Möhnesee, Germany, in which all the medical care equipment and materials are stored and kept ready for use. ARCHEMED urgently needed a pedestrian high lift pallet truck for this work, because the existing machine was no longer usable due to its age and corresponding condition. Dr. Peter Schwidtal, the founder of ARCHEMED, approached STILL to find a new logistics solution for the warehouse. After analysing the requirement and making an on-site visit, it was immediately clear that STILL should donate a pedestrian-operated high lift pallet truck to assist the association in its difficult but very necessary task. ARCHEMED’s success is based on pro bono work by many voluntary helpers from Germany and other neighbouring countries – including mainly doctors, nurses and craftspeople – who are deployed several times a year in Eritrea, where the association now supports 24 projects. ARCHEMED is financed by private donations, grants from foundations and subsidies from the German Ministry of Development.
On the occasion of the handover of the EGV pedestrian high lift pallet truck to the association, Andreas Gutzeit, Sales Manager of STILL’s Dortmund branch, said “We are delighted that we are also able to support ARCHEMED’s humanitarian aid through our donation. Every child on this earth should be given an opportunity to receive basic medical care. It’s frightening. Here we live in a high-tech world controlled by Industry 4.0, cyber-physical systems and artificial intelligence, while children are dying at the other end of the world due to a lack of the necessary hygiene, because reliable electricity and water supplies cannot be guaranteed, or because the technologies needed to care for new-born and premature babies are non-existent.”
The not-for-profit association ARCHEMED – Doctors for Children in Need e.V., was founded by Dr. Peter Schwidtal in Soest, Germany, in 2010 with the aim of decisively improving the lives of children in Eritrea by providing medical and humanitarian assistance. Numerous projects and clinic buildings financed by the association ensure sustainable help for Eritrean children and thus for their families. This work is done directly on the spot by volunteer doctors, nurses and technical teams: no longer only in the capital city Asmara, but now in five other provincial clinics as well. ARCHEMED runs a modern surgery centre for children (IOCCA) in which 500 – 600 successful operations are performed on children every year, more than 100 of them accounted for by heart operations alone. As well as the broad surgical and conservative spectrum, ARCHMEMED’s core competence is in perinatal medicine, i.e. safe obstetric care together with looking after new-born and premature babies. Moreover, the association sees its mission as the sustained, consistent training of indigenous doctors and nurses at the patient level, i.e. in basic skills, so as to make the association superfluous in the long term through knowledge transfer.
As one of the few African countries, Eritrea has already been the subject for several years of the objective formulated in the UN Millennium Development Goals, namely to reduce infant mortality by two thirds or more. ARCHEMED has also played a large role in this through the construction of neonatal wards and by ensuring the qualification of indigenous personnel. This means that progress – even in the world’s poorest countries – is possible if help is targeted and sustainable.
STILL high lift pallet trucks