COAST Trust on 30 and 31st March, 2020 has distributed Tk 16.00 lakh to 8 coastal districts like Bhola, Cox’s Bazar, Chattogram, Feni, Laxmipur, Patuakhali, Barishal and Jhalakathi and 37 coastal upazillas to Deputy Commissioners and Upazilla Nirbahi Officers with Tk 50 thousand and Tk 25 thousand respectively in the government created corona virus welfare fund. But in Bhola district it has given TK. 1 lakh and Charfession and Kutubdia Upazilla it has given Tk. 50 thousand and Tk. 2 lakh respectively. Notably here that, this money has been spent from COAST Disaster Mitigation Fund created from micro finance service charge.
Considering the situation, since March 10, various activities have been undertaken in 9 coastal districts in its working areas. Earlier, the organization continued its vigilance program at various stages. For example, creating awareness videos, promoting shows on Facebook, creating and distributing leaflets, building awareness regularly among members and follow-ups during home visits. Also, guidance and motivation is provided to employees through regular video conferences. This money has also been managed from its Disaster Mitigation Fund too.
Other activities undertaken by COAST were: the distribution with awareness discussion with 9.5 lakh leaflets in the families, schools, colleges, madrasas, religious institutions of Bhola, Barishal, Noakhali, Chattogram, Cox’s Bazar, Patuakhali, Jhalakathi, Laxmipur, Feni districts. The leaflets were distributed to 1,35,700 member-participants of micro finance programs, in 237 union parishads, 51 upazila parishad, 9 zilla parishad, 539 religious institutions, 299 madrasas, 434 primary schools, 280 high schools and 140 colleges. district and upazila offices, and health complexes. Besides, the community radio-Radio Meghna, located in Charfasion, is regularly broadcasting awareness stories, information, news and PSAs, the programs are also in on line countrywide.
Besides, on 20 and 28 March, 2020 in an attempt to raise awareness of the Rohingyas, 2.80 lakh leaflets were printed in Burmese Language and distributed to 9 camps and 77 camp mosques with group discussions. Leaflets were also printed in Bengali. Total 6 different videos in 3 languages (Bangla, Burmese and Chittagonian) are also made and from 11 March, those are uploaded through the COAST Trust’s Facebook page and YouTube channel. All materials can be found in coast website (www.coastbd.org)
The organization published five different types of leaflets. Notable among them were the World Health Organization’s leaflet on relief from mental stress, the icddr,b and the Department of Health Prevention’s message on preventing the virus, how to stay home quarantine, the punishments if home quarantine isn’t done properly and so on. Download press release [Bangla] [English]
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