The Great Outdoor Gym Company (TGO) has sponsored another 700 new trees at NHS Forest sites including Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool, Bethlem Royal Hospital in South East London and Ysbyty Gwynedd in Bangor. The donation helps mark NHS Sustainability Day on Thursday 19 March 2020. Since 2012, TGO has sponsored over 3,900 trees in the NHS Forest, one tree for every piece of outdoor gym equipment sold.
Some of these 700 trees will be planted at Bethlem Royal Hospital, a psychiatric hospital run by South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, where TGO has installed an inclusive outdoor gym for inpatients and staff to get active together. This has provided the hospital’s service users with new opportunities to gain outdoor exercise, offering benefits for mental and physical health and encouraging smoking cessation. Some silver birches will be planted at St Thomas’ hospital in Westminster as a tribute to the TGO's late chairman, John Tarrant, who battled with diabetes and heart disease. John overcome type 2 diabetes with regular exercise and a low sugar diet.
Sarah Dandy, NHS Forest Coordinator, said: “Thanks to the Great Outdoor Gym Company a number of our NHS Forest sites will be creating woodlands, which will bring environmental and therapeutic benefits for all who access the healthcare estates.”
Georgie Delaney, TGO Joint MD, said: “Now more than ever we need to look after our health and protect nature. Movement is a great form of preventative medicine, boosting immunity. So is getting out in nature, especially for our mental health. Our partnership with the NHS Forest is completely in line with our ethos at The Great Outdoor Gym Company. Our health is linked with the health of the planet. By restoring forests, we restore our own wellbeing. We can also take the pressure off the NHS by activating our own natural medicines like movement, sunshine and good nutrition.”