Covid-19 outbreak: Red Cross provides Tk 4,500 each to 6,000 families in CHT
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), in collaboration with the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS), assisted over 30,000 people of 6,000 families in urban areas of Chittagong Hill Tracts with a cash grant of BDT 4,500 each family affected by coronavirus pandemic.
The assistance was provided between May 19 and 24 and is meant to improve the beneficiaries' food consumption, said the ICRC in a statement today.
As the Covid-19 pandemic continues unabated, many people, especially in hard to reach CHT communities, are facing acute food shortages due to lack of work. The communities in dire need require assistance to cope with the ever-changing situation, ICRC said.
Explaining the objective of this cash support program, MA Halim, community development director of BDRCS, said, "We are targeting families whose members tested positive to Covid-19, households depending on daily wages, families with no access to income, women-headed households, persons with disabilities etc to meet their basic food and non-food needs."
Such assistance will have an improved impact on their dietary diversity and help restore the food consumption in quantity and quality while covering their other basic needs, he said.
Besides this support, Rangamati, Bandarban and Khagrachari district prisons have received hygiene items to tackle the spread of coronavirus among the prison population, including both for detainees and prison staffers alike.
The BDRCS volunteers continue to assist the district detention authority to implement the Infection Prevention and Control measures.
Besides, food parcels were distributed to 3,000 families in the three CHT districts covering seven days of need, implemented by the BDRCS with the financial support from ICRC.
Preventive audio messaging on Covid-19 continues to be sent to more than 200 community leaders across the CHT region while such messages in the form of leaflets have further been shared during the cash distribution.
The ICRC, in partnership with the BDRCS, has been implementing community-based livelihood support programs since 2014.
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