The Sai Prema Foundation Founder, Sadguru Sri Madhusudan Sai was today honoured by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade, Manoa Kamikamica for transforming lives through free heart surgeries and healthcare services for children in Fiji.
While speaking during a Special Talanoa Session at the Novotel Convention Centre in Lami, Kamikamica stressed that the government alone can’t move a country forward.
He says it takes the collective will and effort of everyone including the people, private sector, non-profits and faith-based organisations.
Kamikamica says that Sai’s vision of serving the underprivileged has crossed oceans, reaching Sri Lanka, Nigeria and beyond.
The Deputy Prime Minister says before the Sai Sanjivani Children's Hospital in Fiji, families faced heartbreaking choices between financial ruin or the life of their child.
Kamikamica stressed that no parent should ever have to make such a decision.
He says this is the largest healthcare investment ever made by an NGO in Fiji’s history.
The Deputy Prime Minister says children who once had no hope of a future, can now have one and families who once cried tears of fear, weep with joy.
He adds that this is humanity in its highest form and the grant provided to the Foundation is a very small gesture of their appreciation.
General Authority Seventy and member of the Pacific Area Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Elder Taniela Wakolo announced that the Church has now contributed over $1 million in life-saving support to the Foundation, including a $504,000 Vivid 95 ultrasound scanner, 25 syringe infusion pumps and mobile echocardiogram machine which is set to screen up to 14,000 children each year.
Wakolo says it’s not about the money, it is about saving lives.
Madhusudan Sai, in an emotive tribute, praised the Government as a ‘true partner’ by giving them the land when they had none, providing a grant to run the hospital and supporting them with nurses, doctors and paramedics from the Government hospital.
He says the Fiji Government has always been there and Fiji is the only country that has provided the mission with such unwavering support, which they have not received in any other country outside of India.
Meanwhile, over 365 life-saving heart surgeries have been performed on Fijian and Pacific Island children, more than 30,000 heart screenings conducted and over 40,000 Fijians have received free healthcare through the Foundation's outreach and medical services.
