Rhon­da Krys­tal Ram­bal­ly

Princess So­phie, Count­ess of Wes­sex, yes­ter­day plead­ed with three Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ters "to do what they can" to im­prove equip­ment and fa­cil­i­ties at the Princess Eliz­a­beth Cen­tre, Wood­brook. She said she looked for­ward to keep­ing in touch and mark­ing the cen­tre's progress. The princess un­veiled a plaque at the cen­tre in com­mem­o­ra­tion of the Queen's Di­a­mond Ju­bilee.

The cen­tre was opened on Ju­ly 2, 1953 but was called the Princess Eliz­a­beth Home for Hand­i­capped Chil­dren. Princess So­phie was ac­com­pa­nied by of­fi­cials of the British High Com­mis­sion who were giv­en a 45-minute tour of the cen­tre which pro­vides res­i­den­tial ac­com­mo­da­tion for 80 chil­dren and caters to the needs of 50 oth­er chil­dren. In her brief ad­dress to stu­dents and staff, she said: "It has been an un­be­liev­ably spe­cial day."

She thanked the teach­ers, nurs­es and oth­er staff at the cen­tre for the work they had been do­ing with the chil­dren. She said: "For me, it was a spe­cial day get­ting to meet won­der­ful chil­dren." The princess said she loved every mo­ment and it was an ab­solute joy to be at the cen­tre. On a more se­ri­ous note, she turned to Health Min­is­ter Dr Fuad Khan, Peo­ple and So­cial De­vel­op­ment Min­is­ter Dr Glenn Ra­mad­hars­ingh and Min­is­ter of Gen­der, Youth and Child De­vel­op­ment Ver­na St Rose-Greaves and said: "Do what you can. I im­plore you to get bet­ter equip­ment and fa­cil­i­ties."

She re­ceived four gifts from stu­dents. On ar­riv­ing at the cen­tre around 9.55 am, the princess was met by St Rose-Greaves who told her her min­istry's man­date was to look af­ter the well-be­ing of the cit­i­zens and that chil­dren were at the cen­tre stage of that man­date. St Rose-Greaves said: "We are tru­ly grate­ful for this cen­tre be­cause it has played such an im­por­tant role in the lives of our chil­dren not just in Trinidad and To­ba­go but cer­tain­ly in the re­gion."

Fol­low­ing the event, Khan told re­porters the cen­tre was no longer un­der his min­istry. How­ev­er, he said, he as­sist­ed with "any­thing in the med­ical/sur­gi­cal field." Khan said he spoke with bone spe­cial­ist Dr David To­by, who per­forms vol­un­tary ser­vice at the cen­tre, and they were able to iden­ti­fy ar­eas which need­ed as­sis­tance. Khan said a C-arm (mo­bile X-Ray unit) was ur­gent­ly need­ed and al­so op­er­a­tive equip­ment for the op­er­at­ing the­atre .

In his ad­dress, the cen­tre's vice-pres­i­dent Fe­lix Pierre said the Op­er­at­ing The­atre Suite was built in 1969. He said when the cen­tre opened 59 years ago there were 24 chil­dren, most­ly po­lio pa­tients. Pierre said it was La­dy Dos San­tos, pres­i­dent of the T&T red Cross So­ci­ety in 1953, who ex­pressed her de­sire to present to then Princess Eliz­a­beth, a wed­ding gift from the peo­ple of T&T. He said the then princess re­quest­ed that a home be built for hand­i­capped chil­dren, par­tic­u­lar­ly be­cause of the po­lio epi­dem­ic that caused suf­fer­ing in the coun­try.

The roy­al cou­ple ar­rived in T&T on Tues­day and left yes­ter­day on the the RFA Fort Ros­alie from the Cruise Ship Com­plex, Port-of-Spain. They were en­gaged in sev­er­al planned events yes­ter­day and Tues­day. Yes­ter­day they vis­it­ed Bel­mont Boys' Sec­ondary, T&T De­fence Force and the St John's Am­bu­lance Brigade.