Due to a last-minute speaker cancelation, our very own Val Gerhart spoke to us on one of Rotary Internationals Seven Areas of Focus: Rotary Fights Disease.
We believe good health care is everyone’s right, yet 400 million people in the world cannot afford or don’t have access to basic health care.
 
Val shared one of the presentations and videos that she gave to the Benzie Central Middle School Interact group on Rotary International Global Grants combating diseases like malaria, HIV/Aids, polio, Alzheimer's, MS, and diabetes.
 
Rotary’s mission to eradicate polio began over 35 years ago in the Philippines by vaccinating over 6 million children. Along with our partners, we have helped immunize more than 2.5 billion children against polio in 122 countries and have reduced polio cases by 99.9%.
 
Unfortunately, this terrible disease has left millions of survivors with little hope. Wheels of Hope is a Traverse City Rotary Club global project working to provide survivors with much needed wheelchairs free of cost.  Our club is a partner in this global grant.