Thanks to the ladies of the Lifeline Foundation, Sweet and the Calypso Train Tour Company, the Pediatric Ward at the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital received a much needed facelift. The area is now much more child friendly because the walls are decorated with paintings of children’s favourite cartoon characters.

The ladies of Sweet are on a seven-day tour during which they will visit Mexico, Belize and Honduras. One of the group leaders, Jennifer Rainin, said that zipline and river rafting are great but “it is much more fun and we learn a lot more about the country when we spend our time doing something nice for the places we visit.” She said that the people of Belize have been very warm and friendly and “we cannot begin to express how grateful we are for the warmth that everyone is showing us.” The group plans to return in 2011.

Dr. Gary Longsworth, Chief Executive officer of KHMH, said, “It is the first time that I have come in contact with social impact tourism, where people decide to use their leisure time to contribute to the society instead of just having a great time.” He said there is much that needs to be done at the KHMH and that the hospital is extremely grateful to Lifeline, Sweet and Calypso Train Tour for the wonderful project.

Lifeline’s core values are geared towards improving the living conditions of children. No individual is more passionate about those values than the Founder of the Lifeline Foundation, Mrs. Kim Simplis-Barrow. She said, “We really needed to get into this pediatric ward and brighten up the place to make it more child-friendly.” Mrs. Simplis-Barrow hopes that the project will create a sense of awareness to motivate other groups to be partners in the quest to improve the lives of underprivileged kids. Mrs. Simplis-Barrow showed off her surprisingly superb brush techniques as she painted a sketch of the most famous star fish in the world, “Patrick”. All the sketches were the works of Rafael Rodriguez.

The Lifeline Foundation also wishes to thank everyone who supported their last fundraising extravaganza, “A Night in Rio”, and pledges to continue the good work in the community.