Wednesday, 3 February 2016: John McCandless: Environmental Health in Tanzania
Probus Vice-President, John McCandless, delivered a very interesting talk about Environmental Health in Tanzania. He began by relating how a former colleague, Clarence Phenix, had developed strong links with Tanzania. Following his death and in honour of his memory John and his colleagues in N.Ireland renewed contacts with Tanzania, with offers of help. Soon they found themselves assisting with the development of a new BSc. course in Envirinmental Health and with administering a world wide fund to raise money for a new technical reference library. Using his influence as Chairman of the Chartered Institute in the UK and as a member of the International Federation, representing about 40 countries, he was able to raise funds from around the world to create the library in the University of Muhimbili, Tanzania. In addition three graduates from Tanzania were helped to attend university in Manchester where they took Master’s Degrees in Environmental Health, thus enabling them to lecture on degree courses on their return to Tanzania. There is now an intake of 110 undergraduates per year on this course and a further 300 Diploma students in 6 centres around the country. This injection of new graduates has had a significant impact. In 1995 life expectancy at birth in Tanzania was about 39 years; today it is 61. John and his Northern Ireland colleagues were honoured for their work by the people of Tanzania and by their profession worldwide. He was thanked for his talk by Alastair Orr