MANCOSA provides protection for Covid’s frontline soldiers

With the coronavirus putting severe strain on health and nutrition, private higher education institution MANCOSA has distributed thousands of packs of personal protective equipment (PPE) to safeguard healthcare workers and food hampers for the poor.

As the government battles the possibility of a runaway coronavirus outbreak, MANCOSA handed over 5000 PPE packs to hospitals and clinics in KwaZulu-Natal, Eastern Cape, Western Cape and Gauteng.

Professor Magnate Ntombela, Academic and Social Purposes Initiative Director at

MANCOSA, said: “Humanity is presently facing a global calamity second to none, and as a responsible institution, we saw an opportunity in the shadow of the threat to help those who are most vulnerable.”

“Healthcare workers are the frontline soldiers against COVID-19. The virus is spreading and, on the war zone between a nervous public and those responsible for directing national responses, the healthcare workers on whom we all depend can easily be forgotten.”

He said doctors, nurses, carers and paramedics were facing an unprecedented workload in overstretched health facilities, and with no end in sight. They were working in stressful and frightening work environments, not just because the virus is little understood, but because in most settings they are under-protected, overworked and themselves vulnerable to infection.

MANCOSA has provided healthcare facilities with 5000 PPE packs, each with a face shield, a mask and an apron packed in a clear plastic bag with an instruction leaflet. Ten MANCOSA staff members, under the leadership of Hashim Bobat, MANCOSA Marketing Director, volunteered to put the packs together and some of them personally delivered the packs to local hospitals.

“We must do everything to support health workers who, despite their own well-founded fears, are stepping directly into COVID-19’s path to aid the afflicted and help halt the virus’s spread,” Ntombela said.

Raees Ebrahim, regional manager of MANCOSA in Pretoria, said 400 face shields and masks were handed over to the Aurum Institute which is working with healthcare facilities in coordinating the supply of PPE to medical staff.

He said MANCOSA also contributed R25 000 towards the purchase of food hampers by Uplifting Humanity.

“In total 7000 food parcels were purchased, packed and distributed in Spruit township on the East Rand, making this one of the biggest food hamper distributions in Gauteng during the pandemic.”