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In a unique employee-led effort, Interswitch Group, one of Africa’s leading integrated payment and digital commerce players, has raised a total of N305 million towards the organisation’s COVID-19 response effort. Employees of the organisation contributed a total of N75 million and the company augmented their efforts with the sum of N230 million.
This is part of a coordinated effort to complement ongoing public and private sector initiatives to address the spread and mitigate the negative impact of the novel coronavirus pandemic in Nigeria.
The fund from Interswitch Group and its employees is being deployed to support the setting up and equiping of isolation centres, purchase of COVID-19 test kits, provision of personal protective equipment (PPE) and related support to frontline heath workers, as well as the operation of foodbanks to cater to underprivileged communities in Lagos.
Already, Interswitch’s Verve brand has sealed a partnership with the Lagos State Feeding Programme to provide raw foodstuff for poor and vulnerable communities in Lagos. The group also supported the Young President’s Association (YPO) and the Lagos State government in setting up the already functional Eti-Osa isolation centre in Lagos. The fund provided the Delta State government with tropicalized ultra-low temperature laboratory refrigerators that will be used for the storage of reagents and other laboratory consumables and COVID-19 test samples, pending when they will be transported to the designated COVID-19 testing laboratory in Irrua, Edo State.
In addition, Interswitch is finalizing discussions with Edo, Enugu, Kaduna, Ogun and Oyo states in the area of providing test kits and PPEs for frontline health workers.
Leveraging on its core responsibilities as a technology company and systems integrator, Interswitch will be providing free technology for the use of governments and healthcare authorities. Through its healthcare subsidiary, eClat Healthcare, Interswitch is also building a user-friendly, locally-nuanced software application for members of the public as a first-line intervention for the assessment of risk and pre-disposition to the novel coronavirus infection. The software platform analyses users’ information provided from answers to a series of questions around risk factors, recent exposure, observed symptoms, health and travel history.
