Hello

Thank you for taking the time to visit our Justgiving page.

At the end of October, Matthew and I will be travelling to my home country, – Matthew’s first visit (and probably the furthest he has flown as he hates long haul flights!) and I haven’t been since my kidneys failed in 2005, so this will be my first visit after my transplant operation in December 2009.  Needless to say it will be a special occasion, spending time with family and friends, and getting fed lots wherever we go!

However, before enjoying our ‘holiday’, we will be taking part in a charity challenge to help those who face far more challenges than we do on a daily basis.  This involves cycling from the beautiful tea garden region of Sylhet in the north-east to the world’s longest stretch of uninterrupted beach in Cox’s Bazaar in the south-east – 350 miles in 7 days – almost the equivalent of travelling from to !  Due to my transplant, I won’t be taking any risks, but will be supporting the team, which also consists of my siblings and friends, by filming and photographing their efforts and helping with refreshment breaks, cheering, and words of encouragement etc along the way.  Matthew will also be taking part in some of the cycling and is looking forward to the promise of the beach and a dip in the sea at the end of it all!

We are raising money for an ambitious initiative called ‘Vision ’, a partnership between BRAC and Sightsavers International.  Vision seeks to eradicate avoidable blindness in by 2020, initially covering the north-eastern region of Sylhet (where along with about 90% of British Bangladeshis, my family comes from!).  By 2014, the programme aims to provide preliminary eye screening to over 1,000,000 people, treat 800,000 people with minor eye conditions, perform 100,000 cataract operations, train 10,000 BRAC and government community based health workers in eye health to raise awareness about the programme and educate people about the services available to them, and train 100 ophthalmologists and other key personnel in the Sylhet division, before scaling the programme up to other parts of the country.  To achieve their targets, they need to raise £3 million to complete the first phase of the programme in Sylhet alone.

We have set our target at £3,500 (about £10 per mile and could for example pay for almost 50 childhood cataract operations – see the list below for more examples).  We will be paying for all our costs and my parents will be kindly sponsoring the entire team on that all important first leg of the journey from Sylhet to Moulvibazar by hosting us at the family home, so all the proceeds really will go towards Vision .  We would really appreciate any amount you can give us to help us reach or exceed our target.

Thank you again for visiting our site and thank you in advance for all your help!

 

Jelina Berlow Rahman & Matthew Berlow

Examples of where your money will go:

·         It costs just £20 to fund an adult cataract operation.

·         The average cost of a childhood cataract operation in just £75.

·         It costs just £433 to train an ophthalmologist in small incision cataract surgery.

And if you are feeling a bit more generous or would like to initiate a fundraiser of your own J!!!:

·         £3,200 could pay for the training of 1570 community health volunteers to identify eye conditions and refer patients on for treatment.  These health volunteers each visit 114 poor rural households every month.

·         £20,000 could fund 1000 sight restoring adult cataract operations under the Vision Bangladesh programme.

·         £48,000 could fully kit out a medical centre where the team will conduct eye surgery.  The equipment list includes an operating theatre and surgical items.

For more information, please visit the Vision Bangladesh website: http://www.brac.net/content/about-vision-bangladesh