KARACHI, Dec. 15: A senior social worker, educationist and the founder of Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre, Sister Berenice Vargas, died after a protracted illness on Wednesday. She was 79. She served leprosy patients in the country for over 50 years.
Her funeral rites will be held at the St Patrick’s Cathedral on Friday at 4pm. She will be laid to rest at the Christians Cemetery. Later, a condolence meeting will also be held at the Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre, Saddar, in the evening.
Sister Berenice had been suffering from cardiac ailment, hypertension and diabetes for the past many years. She was shifted to a hospital on Wednesday afternoon when her condition deteriorated and she breathed her last in the evening.
A Mexican by birth, Sister Berenice Vargas belonged to a congregation group — Daughters of Heart of Mary —, and with this group, she came to Pakistan in 1955, and started working for leprosy patients in a katchi abadi near McLeod Road, known as Lepers’ Colony.
To serve leprosy patients, she founded the Marie Adelaide Centre in the colony on Aug 16, 1956. After some time, word leprosy was also added to its name and it became Mary Adelaide Leprosy Centre. Thus the journey of leprosy control in the country started in 1956 in Karachi from a tiny shed built by the leprosy patients themselves from wooden fruit crates, under the guidance of the young Mexican Sister.
Being a pharmacist, she remained associated with the pharmacy department of the Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre. She was also a permanent member of the MALC on its board of governors.
She also provided guidance to people in the field of medicine for leprosy. A large number of people who received training from her are serving leprosy patients all over the country. The MALC, with its tireless efforts and committed and hardworking staff, has eventually controlled leprosy in the country.
Sister Berenice Vargas was also the founder-headmistress of the Marium Garden School at Jigar Muradabadi Road near Guru Mandir. She had been living in the hostel of the Daughters of Heart of Mary Congregation located in the school.
KARACHI, Dec. 15: A senior social worker, educationist and the founder of Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre, Sister Berenice Vargas, died after a protracted illness on Wednesday. She was 79. She served leprosy patients in the country for over 50 years.
