This week Eastern Canada and the Caribbean District Governor Sheron Cameron-Dunn of Kingston, Jamaica is visiting the 18 Ottawa-area Kiwanis Clubs which comprise Divisions 12 and 13 of her 18- country, 28- Division and 8,600 member District.
Ms. Cameron-Dunn will be speaking at the Kiwanis Club of Rideau at 13:00 on October 30 at Villa Marconi, 1026 Baseline Road, Ottawa about the recently signed agreement between UNICEF Canada and the Ottawa-based Kiwanis District of Eastern Canada and the Caribbean to raise $1 million (Canadian) over 3 years to combat HIV/AIDS in Jamaica, Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago.
There are over 230,000 people living with HIV in the Caribbean. Last year an estimated 17,000 people became newly infected and 11,000 died of the disease, many of them young children who contracted the the virus during their mother's pregnancy, labour or breastfeeding.
Kiwanians are dedicated to changing the world, one child and one community at a time. We will be focusing our efforts on the children of mothers with HIV/AIDS in the hope that the transmission rate can be reduced from 50% to 2%.
You are invited to the Rideau Kiwanis Club tomorrow to learn more about this worthwhile undertaking.
The Eastern Canada and the Caribbean District is one of 47 Districts and the largest geographic district of Kiwanis International. Presently, it comprises 29 Divisions, 285 clubs and 9,000 members serving the communities in Eastern Canada and the following Caribbean Countries: Bahamas, Jamaica, Netherlands Antilles, Aruba, Trinidad, Martinique, Barbados, Guadeloupe, Suriname, French Guiana, St Lucia, Dominica, Antigua and Guyana. Currently, we have 285 Clubs (35 of which are French speaking) - 114 in Ontario, 28 in Quebec, 33 in Atlantic Canada, 110 in the Caribbean. Our team is symbolized by the Canadian flag linked to the sun of the Caribbean surmounted by the Kiwanis International logo. |