Making her first solo overseas trip on behalf of the Royal Family, mother-of-one Sophie Wessex proved a big hit with children being treated at an eye clinic in the heart of Africa.
The Countess of Wessex received a warm welcome from doctors, nurses and patients alike when she arrived in Moshi, in rural Tanzania, where the charity Vision 2020 is campaigning for local people's right to sight.
Sophie has been a patron of Vision 2020, a voluntary organisation which fights blindness in poor countries, since 2003. Her trip comes just a few months after she and Prince Edward found out their own daughter, Lady Louise, has an eye condition which may require surgery.
She was invited to Africa by Mike Whitlam, who is head of the British Red Cross. The human rights campaigner previously collaborated with Princess Diana on her anti-landmines campaign, but he says his work with Sophie is completely different. "Sophie is very much her own person," he said. "That is very important to her."
The Countess' three-day trip began at a hospital in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro, before she moved on to the eye clinic in Moshi. The 39-year-old is also expected to stop by a mother-and-baby unit in Dares-Salaam before she returns to the UK. |
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