Eleven-year-old Rahul Singh and one-and-a-half-year-old Aditya both suffer from blood cancer. But a unique “Donate a Life” fund has brought smiles back on their faces, enabling them to lead a normal life.
The fund is the brainchild of doctors at the Bhagwan Mahaveer Cancer Hospital, which was grappling with a large number of patients who were unable to bear the cost of expensive treatment. For the doctors, it was painful to see young children being deprived of treatment even for curable cancers for want of money.
“Donate a life”
The dedicated “Donate a Life” fund, with the current corpus of ₹2.13 crore, is maintained with contributions from philanthropists, trusts, donors and some private companies. The entire cost of treatment, including medicines, investigation, bed, nursing and doctors’ consultation, is borne by it. “If an innocent child, whose cancer is eminently treatable, succumbs to the disease only for want of money, it would be a blot on society. It should shake our conscience,” S.G. Kabra, the hospital’s Director (Clinical Services), told The Hindu . By donating ₹5 lakh, one can effectively donate a life, as the cured child leads a normal and productive life and is an asset to society, he said.
Flagship programme
The flagship welfare programme won appreciation from civil society on World Cancer Day earlier this month.
The fund’s beneficiaries are children below 14 years suffering from three types of curable blood cancers – acute lymphoblastic leukaemia low risk, acute promylocytic leukaemia and Hodgkin's lymphoma.
Rahul's father Chaman Lal, who runs a tea shop at Harmada near Jaipur, profusely thanked the donors for extending help for treatment of his son, who is now out of danger and is on high-dose induction. Aditya’s mother Mona Meena said she had brought the boy to the hospital following continuous fever for re-induction after he recovered.
Paediatric oncologist Upendra Sharma said the children who respond to internationally approved chemotherapy protocols are encouraged to slowly get back to their studies and sports. Since August 2014, when the fund was established, 38 children have been declared cancer free and 14 are under treatment.
