This time last year, we broke ground on our combined special needs and pediatric medical facility, a decade-long dream that came to fruition thanks to you, our partners, friends, and Tribe members.
For the past 10 years, we have rented a small space in Maai Mahiu town where against the odds, we provided therapy for hundreds of children and successfully transitioned many to mainstream schools, despite the challenges of limited space and equipment. Fully operational, the CWC will allow us to serve over 600 children with special needs and close to 2,000 children with neurological challenges.
In addition to a special needs school, the Center will house a pediatric medical facility with a walk-up pharmacy, community health education space, and therapy areas. The expanded therapy areas and the ability to hire additional occupational and speech therapy staff will lead to developmental gains with all current patients and hundreds more special-needs children. Access to pharmacy space will allow us to dispense medications on-site, creating higher caliber ongoing care for all patients, and the ability to offer life-saving medicine to children in all our programs. This CWC will result in tremendous impact for children in our region and across Kenya.
By February of this year, we were on track to finish construction by the end of this year and open our doors in January of 2021. Unfortunately, due to the coronavirus pandemic, we had to pause construction for six months. On September 30th, we resumed building, taking all the COVID-19 precautions to keep our construction team safe. Now, thanks to the incredible dedication and hard work of the group, the CWC is 60% complete and on track to be completed in two months.
Once construction is complete, the educational wing, clinic, pharmacy, and community health space will be kitted out and ready for us to move in at the end of April 2021.
We can not wait to open the Centre’s doors; we will keep you updated as we move ever closer to that dream!!!