$1.8M in five years to help lepers

Press, 2 August 1977, Page 5

$1.8M in five years to help lepers

The Leper’s Trust Board — fighting leprosy in the South Pacific — has colected almost SI.BM in the last five years. The annual audit of accounts shows tliat more than half the trust’s income is from general gifts ($243,200 in 1976), although this is followed hard by legacies ($214,000 in 1976). Trust funds are bolstered by investments and interest-earning balances, worth $425,000. However, the expenses of running an appeal take almost a quarter of the appeal takings, and office expenses cost a further $41,800. In spite of high expenses, the trust still has

$362,000 worth of allocations proposed for 1977. Six new members have been appointed to the Lepers’ Trust Board. Three have been members of tne board’s appeal committee — Messrs E. Beardsley, information officer at the University of Canterbury; E. G. Beckett, public affairs manager of the Mount Cook Tourist Company; and C. P. Greenslade, a public relations consultant — and the others are new members — Mr R. W. Nurse, a public accountant; Dr G. Watson, specialist radiologist at Christchurch Hospital, and Dr E. McLachlan, a consultant physician at the Cook Hospital, Gisborne.