Since the beginning of coronavirus crisis, Alavés – Baskonia Group has remained active searching solidarity initiatives aiming to contribute the fight against COVID-19.
The last action has to do with the purchase of health equipment to protect the medical personnel in Vitoria. Taking advantage of their international network relationships, Baskonia and Alavés Group have purchased 93,000 protective gowns, 90,000 protective masks, 76,000 FPP2 safety masks, 100,000 pairs of nitrile gloves and 2,400 protective goggles. In total, 361,000 items, worth 800,000 euros, where Alavés-Baskonia Group contributes with 400,000 euros and Alava’s Provincial Council assumes the rest.
The Group’s president, Josean Querejeta, wanted to highlight the health care personnel efforts and he has committed to continue looking for ways to support them from both sports clubs. “Everything we do for them helps to improve the difficult conditions in which they have worked and are working. There is no doubt that it’s a priority for us to dedicate all our efforts to this. We have taken advantage of our international relationships in order to get equipment that right now it’s difficult to obtain. This work has taken us weeks, but we are succeeding”.
Querejeta has once again transferred his encouragement to all the professionals who are helping in the crisis, and he has congratulated the citizens for their behavior in this crisis. “Now the important thing is health”.
Solidarity by flag
“The process has not been easy because the order had to go through the different companies, which each of them have a significant demand pressure,” said Querejeta. “Once we managed to get this order into production, we had to solve customs and air transport problem, where almost all countries are bidding for their orders and therefore have a long queue. Finally, the order placed has arrived to Vitoria. It has been moved to Buesa Arena as a storage place for all the material, as it is necessary to take into account that there are more than 17,000 kilos or more than 160 cubic meters of material, which will be gradually distributed according to the Alava´s Provincial Council criteria”, concludes the president of Alavés – Baskonia Group.
Other actions
Within COVID-19 framework, Baskonia Alavés Group has carried out a total of 5 noteworthy solidarity actions to date. All of them aimed, specifically, to mitigate the pandemic impact on Alava’s society.
Ibaia donates all the complex available medical equipment. On Monday 16th March, the Club made available to Txagorritxu’s Hospital all the available medical equipment in its facilities in order to help with the protocols the hospital center has to face with COVID-19 pandemic.
With the activity of the first team paused as a consequence of the virus, the medical services of the institution decided to send all the medical equipment to be used by the professionals of the public health service. More specifically, the equipment consisted of gloves, masks, disinfectant and single-use gowns.
Health personnel honor t-shirt
Just as the virus began to hit harder on our Community, the Group announced one of its most symbolic solidarity initiatives by creating a game T-shirt that will make honor to the health community as their teams return to the competition.
The T-shirt was offer for sale and the funds collected will go entirely to the Nurses’ College Organization to set up different projects through the “Nursing Solidarity” cooperation section.
The ‘Sanitary Applause’ bracelet
In the same way the Group did with the T-shirts, another initiative was promoted consisting of the creation of solidarity bracelets that also raised funds to be allocated to the Nursing Association.
The Group was present at the great Alava Sport Solidarity Auction promoted by two doctors, the solidarity auction was created to raise funds to help Alava’s health personnel.
Both Saski Baskonia and Deportivo Alavés were also present at the ‘Eutsi Goiari’ initiative, contributing to it by donating four of their shirts (two per club) in homage to Osi Araba, which both teams will wear when the competitions restart. Moreover, the T-shirts will be signed by the first teams.
With the great Food Collection promoted by the Group together with the eight companies supplying food to Baskonia and Alaves, the entity from Vitoria has turned Buesa Arena Facility into a storage point collecting more than 10,000 food products that these companies have decided to donate in a disinterested way and that will be distributed to two reception centres in the city, the CMAS (municipal hostel) and the Arquillos Residence. Thousands of families from all over the Alava´s Historical Territory will benefit from this action which will also complete the Red Cross shopping cart through its “Red Cross Responds” project.
