The U.K. charity Legs4Africa announced it is sending 1,000 prosthetic legs to mobility departments in West Africa. The shipment will leave England on Jan. 24 and arrive in Gambia in mid-February.
“It is an immensely personal and rewarding feeling to offer someone the independence that comes with a prosthetic leg, especially when [the prostheses] would just be scrapped in the United Kingdom,” Tom Williams, Legs4Africa founder, stated in a press release.
The prostheses will be given to partnering mobility units in Banjul, Gambia and Dakar, Senegal, which will fit them to amputees at no cost.
According to the release, a prosthetic leg in West Africa typically costs roughly the equivalent of $500, which is more than the average annual salary in that region. A crowdfunding campaign raised the equivalent of more than $3,000 so the cost of shipping and transport was fully funded. The goal for 2015 is to collect an additional 2,000 prosthetic legs for another shipment.
