Our story

Beanies 4 Babies was established in 2018 by Johané Palko and Clarette Alfond. As healthcare students rotating through the neonatal ICU of Pelonomi Hospital in Bloemfontein, we noticed the dire need for additional measures to prevent hypothermia in low birth weight and premature babies. After a few volunteers knitted our first sets of beanies and socks, we were able to launch our project at Universitas Academic Hospital in June 2018. The first recipient of our products was an extremely premature baby born at 27 weeks, weighing just over 650g. Today, 6 years later, our management team has grown to a team of 12 members, and we have hundreds of volunteers from all over the country who support our project.
We would not have been able to grow this project without the support of all our volunteers and with their help, we are keeping more than a thousand babies warm every month!