Miss Ghana 2010, Stephanie Karikari and her non-governmental organization, Lumos International Foundation for Empowerment (LIFE) have made donations to patients at the Winneba Municipal Hospital.

On Thursday, Stephanie and her team shared provision boxes of items including rice, oil, sardine, Makarel, spaghetti, tomato paste, salt, sugar, corned beef, oats and others to patients at the Maternity ward of the hospital as part of a pre-Christmas drive.

Speaking during the donation, she stated that she felt compelled as a humanitarian to be proactive at helping as many people as she can.

“For this donation, we wanted to add to what we have been doing for close to a decade now. We have registered children under the National Health Insurance Scheme, and what we are also doing is the provision of IT labs for schools. A lot of schools don’t have IT labs.

"We are focusing on IT because technology is the future. Technology is already here so we are working on all of that,” said the 2011 Miss World Beauty With a Purpose winner.

“For this particular Christmas, we decided to add on the maternity ward because with women and giving birth. You already know as doctors so I can’t talk much about that.

"There is a hunger situation where people find it difficult to make ends meet so we decided that for this Christmas, we would go to three regions to share provision boxes that have rice, oil, tomato paste, sardines, and so forth… everything that makes a meal. I would want to thank you once again for accepting us at very short notice.”

On behalf of recipients of the donated items, Dr Akwasi Bota, Medical Superintendent of the Winneba Municipal Hospital expressed her appreciation to Karikari and her team.

“It was a no-brainer accepting that you should come in. It was easy deciding to receive yourself and your team. It’s isn’t every day that people voluntarily decide to make donations to this hospital. A majority of the people are not well-to-do and so every little donation makes a difference in their lives. They certainly will tell their relatives about the donation which goes a long way to help the image of the hospital. I am very grateful. We are hopeful that this won’t be the last time.”

He also praised the team for the decision to spread awareness about motherhood and maternity and maternity: “It’s good that you chose maternity issues to work on because most of the ladies here at the hospital are either teenagers or unemployed and therefore financially challenged. I am happy that you decided to donate to them because I know they will appreciate the effort. “

Founded in 2012, Lumos International Foundation for Empowerment (LIFE) and its founder have been praised for their dedication to improving the lives of the underprivileged in society.

Some initiatives by the NGO include refurbishing nursery schools in Agbogbloshie, registering young children under the National Health Insurance Scheme, Nungua orphanage donation, and the I Speak for Peace campaign during the 2016 General elections.