As a pioneer in the promotion of healthy lifestyles, Digicel continues in its quest as a good corporate citizen contributing to a healthy Saint Lucia. Digicel partnered with Club Gar St. Lucia for the third annual Walk 4 A Cause, which saw hundreds of Saint Lucians gather at the Vigie Roundabout on Sunday May 29th for the walk which commenced promptly at 6:30 am and culminated at Bois D’Orange on the grounds of Club Gar.
Having officially launched on April 28th, under the theme ‘Today is the day to make a Positive Change’ and the adopted cause for 2016 being diabetes, Digicel and Club Gar embarked on a very intense educational and sensitization campaign to raise awareness on the fight against the crippling disease.
St. Lucia Diabetes and Hypertension Association.
Digicel, along with its brand ambassadors and national sportsmen Darren Sammy and Johnson Charles, forcefully drove the message of making positive lifestyle changes across all mediums. Through a host of radio interviews, endorsement videos, social media promotion, weekly workout sessions and print blitz, Digicel and Club Gar were both destined to achieve this year’s target of raising $30,000, all in an effort to reverse the epidemic of diabetes in Saint Lucia.
President of Club Gar St. Lucia, Mr. Anthony Bristol, asserted his delight in the increased level of participation and success for this year’s walk. “We are extremely pleased with what we have been able to achieve with Walk 4 A Cause 2016. This partnership with Digicel empowered us to further reach corners of Saint Lucia with this powerful message of making positive lifestyle changes. As a club whose primary principle is promoting health, wellness and fitness, and having recognized the impact that diabetes is truly having on our country, we decided to take a stance. Diabetes places a strain on our health resources, it displaces families and communities, it affects productivity, and so much more. This is therefore our way of saying we have had enough and we cannot continue to simply sit by and watch people around us lose their lives and suffer from something that is preventable.”
Commented Mrs Siobhan James-Alexander, Country Manager at Digicel, as she completed the walk enthusiastically, “At Digicel we believe in going beyond just investing and partnering with organizations like Club Gar for initiatives like Walk 4 A Cause, but rather help create opportunity to raise awareness and spark national dialogue on such pertinent issues as health. With Saint Lucia having one of the highest rates of diabetes in the Caribbean, we believe it is very critical to continue to play our part to help foster a more health-conscious nation and this will be manifested as the year unfolds through various other sponsorships and partnerships.”
She added: “We also pride ourselves on being a company who invests just as heavily internally in our human resource. We understand the importance of a healthy workforce, we value the importance of productivity and we recognize that not everyone can do it on their own hence, in whatever way we can provide support, we will. We have increased our health activities for our staff on a monthly basis to truly help transform the lives of our employees. These investments are not only to combat the disease or help raise funds to assist persons living with it but also to contribute to saving generations in Saint Lucia.”
The proceeds raised from Walk 4 A Cause 2016 will go to the St. Lucia Diabetes and Hypertension Association.
