Durban North community clothes Fish and Chip Babies

THE Durban North community has donated bags full of baby clothes toward Fish and Chip Babies, an international movement that aims to provide baby clothes to newborns.

“It’s called Fish and Chip Babies because babies are being sent home from hospital wrapped in newspaper like fish and chips,” said Heidi Allan, an uMhlanga based audiologist and speech therapist who spearheaded the clothes collection.

“Going into winter, there’s a huge demand. We can’t send our babies home cold,” she added.

Allan has been amazed by the generosity of the Durban North community after she appealed for baby clothes donations to assist her mother, Ailene Basel, a Johannesburg resident who knits beanies and jerseys to add to clothing pack donations.

“I started knitting beanies and fingerless gloves to donate to day workers and then I heard about the babies in need,” said Basel.

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“My mother started knitting for her local hospital but couldn’t find an outlet during the lockdown. She hopes the initiative will grow across South Africa because there’s such a desperate need for clothing packs for newborn babies. When she couldn’t get clothes to go along with her knitted beanies and jumpers, she asked me for help,” said Allan.

While Allan started the collection to send the clothes to her mother, the initiative has grown bigger with Durban North residents requesting the pattern to start knitting.

“If we can find a distribution place for it here, my mother will send the knitted items down to me and I’ll make up the packs,” said Allan.
While the initiative offers vital clothing to newborns, it also benefits donors.

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“There are a lot of people, particularly during lockdown who are on their own at home. To be given a purpose, that’s where the value has been for my mother. She can’t go anywhere, but she can knit and at the end of the day she has something worthwhile to give,” said Allan.

Clothes donations can be delivered to Allan’s practice at uMhlanga Medical Centre, suite 604. To arrange for clothes to be picked up, contact Allan on
083 783 4086.

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