Teaching-aids at Low Cost
| Founded | 1965 |
|---|---|
| Type | Non-governmental organization |
| Focus | textbooks, Health, Water, Sanitation, Environment, Health education |
| Location |
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Area served
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International |
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Key people
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Madeleine Bates, Chief Executive |
| Website | www |
Teaching-aids at Low Cost (TALC) is an international non-profit organisation that was set up in Britain in 1965 by Professor David Morley (paediatrician). At a directors meeting on 26 January 2017 it was decided that the name of the charity would be changed to Health Books International in order better to reflect the current activities of this non-government organisation.
Teaching-aids at Low Cost was formed by Professor Morley CBE, MD, FRCP when he was lecturer at the Institute of Child Health, London in response to many requests from overseas students for teaching equipment to use in their own countries. His vision was to provide books about health and teaching materials cheaply to healthcare workers and others in low income settings. Originally TALC compiled 35mm slide sets with accompanying notes that clinical teachers could use to illustrate their lectures, showing, for example, what a measles or smallpox rash looks like.
TALC also supplied (and continues to supply) other materials including special spoons for measuring out the correct proportions of sugar and salt to be given to children as life-saving oral rehydration drinks. Good relationships between practising clinicians working both in the South and expatriates working in industrialised nations and in low income settings ensures that supplies are arranged according to need and utility. One simple example of this is the mid upper arm circumference tapes that are used for rapid diagnosis of malnutrition. These are now plasticised to give them longer lives in harsh situations. In the early days much of the work of packing up materials and posting them abroad was done by volunteers based in Saint Albans, Hertfordshire.
The charity now has its base in Harpenden, Hertfordshire. With the stampede towards electronic publications and the difficulty of distributing heavy items, many “experts” stated that the days of transporting books to the tropics were long gone. However it is clear that there is still a role for a niche book distributor of practical guides about clinical medicine, health training materials and information on environmental sanitation for use in low income, non-industrialised countries. In addition the photographic slide sets are being reformatted for digital media. Materials deemed by some as outdated including flannelgraphs and laminated charts and posters suitable for illiterate target audiences are still in great demand. TALC continues to distribute these at minimal cost as well as malnutrition tapes and oral rehydration spoons. According to the Chair’s Report of 2015, over the course of its 50 year history TALC has sent over 10 million books, slides and accessories to thousands of healthcare workers in low-income counties and fragile states
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