Lions Club to build Sh150m eye hospital

By KEVINE OMOLLO

Lions Club International will build a Sh150 million state-of-the-art eye facility in Kisumu county.

The hospital, whose construction starts in two weeks, will be the first of its kind in East Africa.

The facility will provide eye treatment at subsidised rates to the poor. It will also handle referals of sophisticated eye cases.

A Memorandum of Understanding was signed yesterday by Kisumu Governor Jack Ranguma and past Governor of Lions Club International Ramesh Mehta.

The county government will provide a five-acre parcel of land at Korando Centre, five kilometres West of the Central Business District, while Lions Club will develop the facility.

Apart from providing general eye diagnosis, the facility will house an internal industry to manufacture lenses to facilitate making of eye glasses.

“Currently it takes quite long to acquire appropriate lenses for very complicated eye diagnosis, but with this facility it will be faster and cheaper,” said Ramesh.

He added that the initial project targets the eye facility, but the club will develop a hearing and dental unit as well as a kidney diagnosis centre.

Ramesh said the facility will serve a bigger population in Kenya and East Africa as Kisumu is in a central position. Ranguma said the club had attempted to acquire land to expand its services for four years but had been hampered by the local government.