From the Executive Director’s Desk

Season’s greetings to you all and it is a pleasure, to address you on this platform for the first time. We count ourselves fortunate for safely navigating our way through the stormy times of the COVID-19-induced lockdowns last year, going into the New Year.

I am happy to report that we have registered success in most of our programming with several children going into remission despite fears that childhood cancer patients would be affected more by COVID-19, given their already compromised immunity. During this period, we did see several mortalities, which could be attributed to poor nutrition and some of the children defaulting on treatment during the lockdown.

The childhood cancer survival rate remains low despite our spirited efforts in rolling out awareness programs and pushing for early detection and treatment. We have managed to provide our core services to our constituency despite the myriad of challenges we have faced in the process. A special thank you to the National Aids Council for assistance with these services.

We have rolled out robust awareness campaigns across the country with specific visits to several places (schools included) in Harare, Mash East, -West, Bulawayo, and Masvingo and we will continue in the New Year to ensure no child is left behind.

We have also tried to replicate our work on the ground and amplify it in the virtual world to improve our visibility and this year we have witnessed growth.

I am glad that our work largely went unhindered during this year, and we have managed to retain most of our partners and donors, a move that has kept our programming in motion.

Jorge Paolo Lemann (Co-founder, Bance Garantia) once said, “The greatest asset of a company is its people”.

I commend our board and staff for working their hearts out throughout the year. For us, multi-tasking remains a central cog in our work and our volunteers have made the work easy.

I want to encourage everyone to join hands as we work towards recouping lost time during lockdowns. Last but not least, I am happy to report that as I write, we are in the process of relocating to our new home at the Rainbow Children’s Village, behind Belgravia Shopping Centre on East Road, in partnership with Roundtable Zimbabwe and the Meikles Foundation.

Please keep safe, sanitize, and do not forget to socially distance yourself.

Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year.

Team KidzCan

Daniel Mckenzie