Rotorua Daily Post Christmas Appeal: Ranolf Medical Centre to Fill the Caravan for Salvation Army

The Ranolf Medical Centre team are encouraging patients and members of the public to get behind the Rotorua Daily Post 2020 Christmas Appeal for the Salvation Army. Photo / Andrew Warner

The Rotorua Daily Post Christmas Appeal is under way and when it comes to supporting the cause, Ranolf Medical Centre is leading from the front.

Earlier this year, Covid-19 and the resulting lockdown meant, like many others, the team at the medical centre had to rethink how they did things.

"At the beginning of lockdown we were all very apprehensive about what we were going to do and how we were going to do it," Dr Harry Pert said.

"We wanted to not have people coming into the surgery for social distancing and safety reasons, so we basically stopped seeing people here. We went from seeing 200 people a day in person to probably 10.

"That coincided with the flu season, so we wanted to be able to give flu shots out in the carpark. Basically, we used the caravan as an outside clinic and to pay credit to our medical staff - they did thousands of flu vaccinations."

To make this easier, the Salvation Army loaned Ranolf Medical Centre a caravan which allowed staff to administer flu shots in the carpark without having people crowding into the centre itself.

Now, to say thank you, the team at the medical centre want to fill the caravan with non-perishable goods to be donated to the Salvation Army Foodbank as part of this year's Christmas Appeal.

They are encouraging their patients, as well as any members of the public who want to contribute, to drop off cans and other non-perishable food items to the caravan on the Ranolf St side of the medical centre.

"For us, it was really important that people got flu vaccinations for winter," Pert said.

"We were very worried that the hospitals would be overwhelmed by people with flu and coronavirus. We didn't know what we were dealing with then.

"We're enormously grateful to the Salvation Army for making that possible. Now, we want to help repay them by supporting the appeal for this Christmas. We encourage people in our community to support the Salvation Army."

Pert said the Salvation Army worked tirelessly to support the Rotorua community and that now was the time for the community to give back.

"They've been supporting the community during what has been a very difficult time for a big chunk of our community.

"They're going to remain busy for a long time so I think all of us, the whole town, need to say thank you to the Salvation Army because they do a fabulous job.

"Fill the Caravan is like a mini Fill the Bus but I don't want to take away from that event. Let's fill everything, we'll be very happy to pass it all on."

The Rotorua Daily Post 2020 Christmas Appeal runs from November 7 to December 19. Fill the bus will be held on December 2.

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