Building Capacity in the Caribbean
"If I don't do it, who will?"
Wes Hall calls his grandmother the most successful person he’s ever known. Not because of success measured in dollars, but because of her success raising him and 14 half-brothers and sisters. He recognizes how fortunate he was to leave extreme poverty in Jamaica and “achieve the Canadian dream”.
“Philanthropy is in our family DNA.”
The current objective of the SickKids-Caribbean Initiative is building capacity in paediatric cancer and blood disorders there, and in five other countries. Wes Hall knows how necessary this is. The difference in outcomes for a Canadian child with cancer compared to a child in the Caribbean is stark: it’s estimated that the survival rate for Canadian children with cancer is over 80%, while in the Caribbean overall (it varies by country), it’s about 50%. Narrowing that gap by training the Caribbean’s medical professionals in paediatric cancer and blood disorders is the aim of Wes’s philanthropy – a philanthropy he wants to instil in his children.
