Oak Ridge Today

Oak Ridge Rotary Club helps hometown, the world

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Elaine Bunick and Adolf King and Ghanaians

Elaine Bunick and Adolf King, members of Rotary Club of Oak Ridge, are pictured with Ghanaians in the village where they led the medical and educational missions. (Submitted photo)

 

The Rotary Club of Oak Ridge is helping its hometown and communities in the world.

The club contributed $2,500, which was matched by a Rotary District 6780 grant, yielding $5,000 that financed the renovation of a room in the Oak Ridge Boys and Girls Club building. Anne Dunthorn, the club secretary and grant writer, helped Jennifer Pettyjohn, the chief and special officer of the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Clinch Valley, identify a District 6780 matching grant and prepare and submit the winning application.

Elaine Bunick, club member and endocrinologist in Oak Ridge, spearheaded the successful medical and educational mission in late July in the eastern African nation of Ghana. More than 1,800 patients in the village of Nkonya-Wurupong received medical treatment and used, or will use when needed, $250,000 worth of anti-malarial and other medications. [Read more…]

Spotlight: Rotary leads fight against polio

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‘We are this close to ending polio’

Rotary International, which includes some 1.3 million members in 33,000 clubs in more than 200 countries around the world, celebrated October 24 as World Polio Day.

Since 1985, Rotary has led the battle against polio, as worldwide cases plummeted from 350,000 per year to several hundred—a 99 percent reduction.

“This is a source of pride to Rotarians everywhere,” says District Governor Jerry Wear of Rotary District 6780, which includes East Tennessee. “In our relentless fundraising efforts and our participation in inoculation days around the world, Rotarians are committed to carrying this important mission to completion.”

Today, polio is endemic in only three countries—Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Pakistan. When India came off that list in 2012, it was an important step toward eradicating a human disease from the earth for only the second time in history. (The first disease so eradicated was smallpox.) [Read more…]