Two re-purposed shipping containers left the Port of Charleston, South Carolina last week onboard the Safmarine vessel, Maersk Visby, bound for the Port of Walvis Bay, Namibia. Once unloaded, they will be trucked to an informal settlement area called the “DRC” outside Swakopmund limits in the Erongo Region. The two shipping containers then will be placed on a site already prepared. When the container doors open, a fully-functional, fully-supplied clinic will provide maternal and child healthcare for people who previously had to travel five kilometers for the nearest medical facility.

In response to alarming maternal and child mortality rates in Namibia, a middle income, sub-Saharan African nation, C2C is partnering with the Ministry of Health and Social Services to address the highly-treatable conditions that are the primary causes of neonatal and maternal deaths during childbirth. Damco , in conjunction with Safmarine, both members of the AP Moller-Maersk Group, are providing all overland and ocean transportation services in collaboration with Containers 2 Clinics (C2C).

In 2010, Damco transported C2C's first clinic to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, helping to provide essential care to women following that nation's devastating earthquake. “By providing pro bono shipping of container clinics, Damco and Safmarine help create greater opportunity for better health for women and children," Elizabeth Sheehan, founder and president of C2C said.

"This is a terrific example of organizations collaborating to help others in ways which neither could accomplish without the other. We can't say enough about AP Moller-Maersk's generosity and shared commitment to essential human rights,” Sheehan said.

The Damco-C2C partnership highlights the value of using shipping containers as health facilities. Container clinics are durable and movable, allowing them to be re-located to respond to changing conditions. C2C designs its clinics for the low-resource regions in which they operate, and they arrive already-equipped for laboratory, diagnostic and treatment operations.

“Damco is proud to partner with C2C to enable life-saving care where it is much-needed but not readily available. There is great benefit in assembling these clinics in the United States, but it does create the need to get them where they're so beneficial," said Jeremy Haycock, president of Damco USA, Inc. "That creates a role for us and we're glad to do our part."