Illustrative stock photo (source: TASR)
Our paywall policy
The Slovak Spectator has decided to leave all the articles about the coronavirus available for everyone. If you appreciate our work and would like to support good journalism, please buy our subscription. We believe this is an issue where accurate and fact-based information is important for people to cope.
Thousands of people working at hospitals, as well as numerous employees in social care facilities working with seniors and ill people are being exposed to the direct risk of being infected with the coronavirus. However, medical workers often lack the necessary equipment and protective means to operate safely.
To solve the problem, the new KtopomozeSlovensku.sk online platform was created. It is the first organised and well arranged system of securing finances and equipment for the material support of hospitals and social care facilities in Slovakia.
>>> Follow news about the coronavirus in Slovakia here.
The platform was created by a team around Šimon Šicko, CEO of Pixel Federation, the biggest Slovak company dealing with the development of computer games.
“One thing is clear in this coronavirus epidemic: that it is already impacting and changing the lives of everybody, either in the form of strict restrictions or financial damage,” Šicko said. “While we, the ordinary public or entrepreneurs, have to limit only our lifestyle and stay home, medical workers need to go to work every day, where they are exposed to great danger. It is thus our responsibility to help, either financially, through services or products, or our time.
Organisational team
Šimon Šicko, Pixel Federation
Lukáš Fila, Denník N
Zuzana Suchová, fundraising, marketing & PR of Demotivácia, influencer
Lucia Pašková, Curaden Slovensko
How does it work?
The platform will be developed and extended in the future, based on the offer of services and available equipment.
It now contains a simple form for those applying for help and the possibilities for companies or individuals to help.
The help will be distributed in all regions of Slovakia.
The decisions on where to distribute the help and how to prioritise the applications will be made by an expert team that is currently being created.
“But we’re trying to do everything very simply, because this problem needs to be solved very quickly,” Šicko said.
Guarantors and expert committee members
Ľudmila Kolesárová, Dobrý Anjel foundation
Pavol Andel, dentist
Ľubica Kočanová, the Association of Nurses and Patients
First help to be distributed soon
The platform has already recorded several applications for help, as well as donors. They have managed to collect some €70,000, with the main donors being VÚB Banka, Pixel Federation and Lucia Pašková of Curaden Slovensko.
The money will be used to buy six air cleaners for the University Hospital in Bratislava.
Other items on the list are respirators, masks and protective clothes, antibacterial soaps and disinfectant products. Šicko has also contributed to buying gloves that will soon be ready for distribution.
Hundreds of masks and gloves have been distributed to the Kramáre hospital in Bratislava and the emergency unit in Zvolen (Banská Bystrica Region), and they will also be delivered soon to the Martin hospital (Žilina Region).
The logistics will be secured by another partner of the platform, the Curaden Slovensko company, through its warehouse in Bratislava.
