Skycity Rebuilds Burnt Out Clinic

1 August 2007

Skycity Rebuilds Burnt Out Clinic

Early next year the South Auckland community will have something special to smile about. Thanks to two grants from the SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust a Mangere community dental clinic - that was a victim of arson earlier this year - will be completely rebuilt.

The grants totalling $300,000, together with additional funding from the Counties Manukau District Health Board, will allow the Buckland Road Community Oral Health Clinic to be completely reconstructed.

The grants were originally awarded to renovate the existing clinic, but the arson attack gutted the building so badly that the clinic now has to be built from scratch. The attack has meant local families have had to seek dental care from alternative school clinics and Middlemore Hospital.

The official launch of the clinic rebuild is on 7 August 2007 - which will coincide with World Dental Health Day. The new clinic is set to open in early 2008.

SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust Chairman Jock Irvine says the Trust is proud to support such an important community project that will benefit the South Auckland Community at large.

"The clinic will assist some of South Auckland's most high need families - particularly children. As a group Counties Manukau children have the poorest oral health in Auckland - over 35% have tooth decay by the time they start school. This is a worrying statistic when dentist visits are free for children under the age of 18.

"We are hopeful that the new Buckland Road Community Oral Health Clinic will make dental health more accessible to the South Auckland community".

Pam Tregonning, Executive Director of the South Auckland Health Foundation is thrilled about the SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust support.

"There is a real need to improve oral health in the Counties Manukau area and the new clinic will provide a modern dental facility that will double the number of patients the old clinic could accommodate.

"The new clinic will also provide a training facility and incorporate new services that will open the clinic to a wider range of people.

"I want to thank SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust for their ongoing support in making a tangible difference to so many lives in the South Auckland area," says Ms Tregonning.

The Community Oral Health Clinic grants follows a 2004 SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust grant of $150,000, which was used to purchase the mobile dental van for the South Auckland area.

This year, to continue the oral health project, the SKYCITY Auckland Community Trust has awarded $150,000 for a community oral health education campaign.

"The Trust has invested over half a million dollars in the past four years to the South Auckland Foundation oral health project. I am sure we will see the benefits of this funding for many years to come," says Mr Irvine

ENDS

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