NAILSEA and Backwell Rotary Club is helping to save the lives of mothers and babies in Africa by paying for hospital equipment.

With the support of Portishead Rotary Club and Nailsea Concert Orchestra, it has donated �13,000 towards the renovation and upgrading of Makunduchi Hospital in Zanzibar, which serves 100,000 people with limited access to healthcare.

The money has paid for an anaesthetic machine to go alongside an incubator, already provided by the Rotary Club in Zanzibar, which will enable the hospital to carry out Caesarean births and reduce infant and maternal mortality, which are 50 times higher than the UK rates.

Local staff have been trained to use the equipment and progress is being managed and monitored by UK experts including Nailsea GP Jon Rees.

Rotary’s project co-ordinator, Geoffrey Irons, says: “This is a cracker of a project. It is sponsored and managed by dedicated professionals and is already making a difference to the lives of very poor people.

“It has the enthusiastic backing of the Zanzibar government and has built-in sustainablity. This really is a project where aid money will be used to great and lasting effect.”