Donation to move leftover medical supplies to Third World operating rooms

A donation from members of the Campus Community Police Services will help stock some operating rooms in Third World countries.

CAW Local 195, which represents campus police and parking services officers, made a $300 contribution from its charity fund to help pay the costs of shipping a pallet of surgical supplies to healthcare providers in resource-poor areas of Africa and Asia.

Students at the Windsor program of the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry have been collecting items readied for surgery in the operating rooms of local hospitals that remain unused at the end of the procedure. Through Operation Green, these items that would otherwise go to waste instead provide surgical supplies to areas in need.

“We like to give back to initiatives that start here on campus,” says special constable Anthony Liolli, a vice-president with the union’s campus unit. “We saw media coverage of this project and thought it was a good cause.”

The $300 donation should just about cover the costs of delivering one shipment, says spokesperson Danielle Soulliere, a UWindsor biology grad and first-year medical student.

“We have filled one wooden pallet with materials—everything from surgical gloves and gowns to bandages and suturing kits, alcohol swabs and tubes,” she says. “It’s all perfectly usable and sterile.”

Soulliere says a full pallet is taller than her and weighs more than 400 lbs.

“It’s so expensive to ship, we have to constantly work to raise the necessary monies,” she says. “Today’s donation will get the supplies where they’re needed. We appreciate it so much!”