SAN­DRA L BLOOD

Wood­brook Sec­ondary School’s e-alum­ni body is mak­ing an ur­gent ap­peal to alum­ni, fam­i­ly, friends, and well-wish­ers to help raise $475,000 for Class of 1981 alum­nus Kurt Ger­ard Charles, who re­quires emer­gency surgery on Au­gust 28.

Charles is sched­uled to un­der­go a coro­nary artery by­pass graft and aor­tic valve re­place­ment at the Com­mu­ni­ty Hos­pi­tal of SDA in Co­corite. The pro­ce­dure will be per­formed by US-trained in­ter­ven­tion­al car­di­ol­o­gist Dr Ka­mar Tayo Adeleke.

On Ju­ly 31, Charles re­ceived an of­fi­cial quote for the surgery, de­scrib­ing the pro­ce­dure as a left heart catheter­i­za­tion and coro­nary an­giogram. The doc­u­ment not­ed that it is an es­ti­mate on­ly, sub­ject to change af­ter surgery, and re­quires a de­posit of $306,000. The es­ti­mate is valid for 60 days from the date of is­sue.

To help meet this goal, three fundrais­ing ini­tia­tives have been launched:

• Take­away Lunch – Au­gust 23: Host­ed by the e-alum­ni, a cur­ried crab and dumpling or cur­ried chick­en and dumpling meal is avail­able at $50 per tick­et. Meals can be col­lect­ed from 11 am to 2 pm at the school.

• Bank Do­na­tions: Con­tri­bu­tions can be made di­rect­ly to Re­pub­lic Bank Ltd. Sav­ings Ac­count No. 1500 3018 0731.

• Go­FundMe Cam­paign: Do­na­tions can be made on­line at https://go­fund.me/c4aOb5a4 or by scan­ning the QR code avail­able on the Wood­brook Gov­ern­ment Sec­ondary School Face­book page.

A life­long pub­lic ser­vant, Charles ded­i­cat­ed his ca­reer to the So­cial Wel­fare Di­vi­sion. He is al­so a for­mer chair­man of the Spe­cial Olympic Games Or­gan­i­sa­tion Com­mit­tee and a past mem­ber of The Love Move­ment—a char­i­ta­ble or­gan­i­sa­tion that us­es mu­sic, par­tic­u­lar­ly through its choirs, to spread the mes­sage of God’s un­con­di­tion­al love and up­lift com­mu­ni­ties.

Cur­rent­ly on a spe­cial di­et, Charles is said to be rest­ing com­fort­ably as he pre­pares for surgery, hope­ful for a suc­cess­ful out­come and look­ing for­ward to per­son­al­ly thank­ing every­one who made it pos­si­ble—af­ter giv­ing thanks to God.

For fur­ther in­for­ma­tion or to place take­away or­ders, call or What­sApp (868) 333-8816.