Lornke
The Rotary Club of Port Harcourt in collaboration with the Federal Road Safety Corp have engaged commercial drivers on Health and road safety tips as the yuletide approaches.
A medical outreach of Free eye tests and glasses and road safety tips were carried out amongst Commercial drivers at the popular waterlines motor park to prepare them for the busy yuletide season.
President of the Rotary Club of Port Harcourt, Mike Ezeanya said the drivers were chosen because of some road accidents related to drivers’ poor health and safety consciousness.
Rotarian President Mike Ezeanya said the tests conducted so far on one hundred and fifty commercial highway drivers, revealed that over seventy percent of commercial drivers ply the roads with poor eye vision and high blood pressure.
“This outreach in collaboration with the Road Safety Corp, Rivers State Command, is targeted at the commercial drivers because of the major role they play as drivers especially on the highway during the Christmas and New Year period. You know we are already in the ember months where the road will be busy and lots of passengers will be travelling. We realized during the medical outreach that majority of the drivers here don’t take care of themselves, lots of them are having serious problems with their sights. We also found out that most of the drivers plying the highways are driving with very high blood pressure which can lead to any of them collapsing on the wheels thereby putting at risk the lives of their passengers. We advise them to go for regular check up and some eye glasses were given to them by our optometrists here”, Ezeanya said.
On his part, general manager of the River Joy motor park, Peter Bruce said the initiative has increased the commercial drivers’ awareness on the need to take their well being seriously.
He said road crashes will be reduced if the sensitization continuous among the commercial drivers.
“This initiative by the Rotary Club of Port Harcourt in Collaboration with the Federal Road Safety Corps is a wonderful one. The drivers appreciated it and turned out in their numbers to be tested. The drivers were given eye glasses, drugs and safety tips. Those that need surgeries on their eyes as a result of cataract have been referred and they will be fixed. This will really go a long way to reduce road accidents because we the drivers have learned more. We ask the Rotary Clubs to carry out more of this and bring it to our door steps so it will avert more deaths and road mishaps. We are really grateful and happy,” Bruce said happily.
Our correspondent reports that over 100 correctional eye glasses were given free to commercial drivers with long and short sightedness eye defects, eye drops and Blood pressure drugs were also given to some of the drivers and members of their families who benefitted from the medical outreach organized by the Rotary Club of Port Harcourt at the Rivers Joy Motor Park.
