The Indian Red Cross Society (IRCS) organised an orientation programme on ‘Hygiene Promotion and Household Water Treatment (HWT)’ on November 8 here to build up a team of trained volunteers who will organise awareness camps in the cyclone and flood affected villages to promote hygiene practices and different household water treatment techniques.
IRCS State branch honorary secretary Dr MP Mohanty inaugurated the training, while Youth Red Cross Officer Dr Sarita Supkar, Seema Mohanty from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (New Delhi), Utkarsh Pandey and Rajneesh Kumar from the IRCS (New Delhi) and SK Sahoo facilitated the training.
Notably, right from the day when first news of Phailin was confirmed, the IRCS branch activated its large pool of volunteers for warning, evacuation and providing shelter to the people in as many as 75 Red Cross cyclone shelters.
It distributed basic relief including dry food packets and candles among the people and within weeks, relief packages containing clothes, tarpaulins and kitchen sets.
One of the major contributions of the IRCS is its commitment to provide ‘purified water’ in affected villages of the State though large water purification units and promoting hygienic practices in the communities.
A SETA and NOMAD machine was installed at Dayavihar Kanas and a water purification unit ‘NORIT’ was installed at Huma in Ganjam District by the branch.
Till date, a total of 1, 23,500 litres of purified water have been distributed in close coordination with respective RWSS units.