Dar tal-Providenza director Fr Martin Micallef told Times of Malta that he was “on the road to recovery” as the charity begins its annual fundraising marathon.
Micallef, who in June revealed he was undergoing treatment for cancer, said that his health had taken a turn for the better and that his prognosis had begun taking steps in the right direction.
A residential home that cares for the needs of 115 people living with disabilities, Micallef said that the COVID-19 pandemic had foisted new and unexpected challenges on the home, which relies on donations and benefactors.
“The pandemic brought on challenges that we weren’t expecting but we got on and had a contingency plan to safeguard the security of both our residents are our staff,” he said.
“The hardest thing for all of us is watching our residents suffer as a result of not having contact with their families. We’ve since invested in mobile phones for residents to be able to meet their loved ones virtually. We also invested in private transport to avoid any of our employees having to use public transport and exposing them to risk.”
All the measures taken by the home to safeguard against COVID-19 saw costs creeping up by an additional €150,000 in running costs.
Archbishop Charles Scicluna celebrating Mass at the Home on Friday.While COVID-19 restrictions means that the charity couldn’t carry out some of it’s other fundraising activities throughout the year, Micallef said that nevertheless progress had been made on a number of ongoing projects.
“Obviously we’ve been a little limited in what we could do, but thankfully a lot of people still made the effort to help us throughout the year,” Micallef said.
“We’ve managed to refurbish one residence and people will be moving back in soon. We’ve also managed to complete works on a new home opening in Balluta. Next, we hope to refurbish some of the flats in the Siġġiewi residence.”
To support it’s running and ongoing projects id-Dar tal-Providenza is hosting it’s Festa ta Ġenerosita, for benefactors to send in donations and support it’s running costs.
Appeals for help were led by Archbishop Charles Scicluna, who on Friday celebrated Mass at the home. He also again appealed to people to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
A televised marathon will be running until midnight and may be watched on TVM, ONE and NET. The event is also being streamed on YouTube.
Online donations can be made on https://www.dartalprovidenza.org/online-donations/
Donations can be made by phone as follows:
€10 51602012
€15 51702013
€25 51802014
€50 51902085
SMS €7 50618922
Donations may also be deposited into the following bank accounts:
APS Bank
IBAN: MT14APSB77046000234320000517554
BIC: APSBMTMT
BOV
IBAN: MT46VALL22013000000011702245152
BIC: VALLMTMT
HSBC
IBAN: MT10MMEB44440000000044082873050
BIC: MMEBMTMT
Lombard Bank
IBAN: MT37LBMA05000000000001440300371
BIC: LBMAMTMT
Banif Bank
IBAN: MT60BNIF14502000000000212865181
BIC: BNIFMTMTXXX