Swimmers are being invited to join Stornoway Rotary in a one-day swimarathon this month in aid of the fight against polio.
The Rotary Club of Stornoway is staging the swimarathon on Saturday 24 October from 4pm to 6pm in the pool at Ionad Spòrs Leòdhais, Stornoway.
Swimmers of all ages and abilities are invited to take part in the event, being held on World Polio Day. It is open to individuals and teams, businesses and organisations.
Every £1 raised will be worth £12 to End Polio Now, due to the Rotary’s match funding programme for this event and its support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Taking part is simple. Teams, organisations and individuals set their own target of double lengths to swim and gather sponsorship or donations against that target.
Whether a swimmer can manage a few gentle double lengths or a marathon of them, every double length counts and swimmers of all ages and abilities are welcome.
Andrew Sim, President of the Rotary Club of Stornoway, said: “This is a wonderful way to have fun, get together with friends or workmates and be part of something genuinely historic. With the Gates Foundation match, a small effort in our pool here in Stornoway goes an incredibly long way towards ending polio for good. We would love to see teams from right across the community take part.”
Sponsor forms are available from reception at the sports centre or by contacting the Rotary Club of Stornoway at
Anyone who would prefer to simply give a donation can drop a donation in the collection bucket that will be in place at the sports centre in the run-up to the event.
To enter a team or find out more, contact the club or visit facebook.com/StornowayRotary.
According to Rotary there has never been a better time to raise money for this cause. That is because every pound raised is match funded at district and national level and then matched two to one by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which means that End Polio Now receives £12 for every £1 in sponsorship.
Rotary has been working to rid the world of polio since the 1980s, when the disease paralysed around 350,000 children a year. Cases have since fallen by more than 99.9 per cent and the wild virus now survives in just two countries.
But the job is not finished. If the effort was to stop now, experts warn that polio could once again paralyse as many as 200,000 children a year within a decade. Finishing the job would make polio only the second human disease ever to be wiped out, after smallpox.
