By Nicholas Osei-Wusu
The first ever Oncology and International Children’s Cancer Research Centre in Africa is being built in Ghana for 250 million Dollars.
The Centre, being constructed at Asikam in the Eastern region, will comprise a hospital, research facilities, housing units and a chapel by ‘Wish4Life Foundation’, a US-based non-profit organization.
The Founder of the Foundation, Dr. Tanya Trippett, disclosed this in Kumasi when the Foundation donated assorted gifts to patients and computer Tablets to the Pediatric Oncology at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.
The Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, KATH, a Kumasi-based tertiary healthcare facility serving as the referral hospital for about 12 of the administrative regions of Ghana, has since 1998 recorded about 10 thousand cases of cancer.
The facility receives an average of 150 new cancer cases annually with children being among the most afflicted.
A Pediatric Oncologist at the Hospital, Dr. Lawrence Osei Tutu, told journalists that, cancer is within the top 10 recorded illnesses at the Hospital usually reported at the advanced stages primarily due to poverty.
“Our top 4, the number 1 is what we call the cancer of the blood or white blood cells called leukemia. Then we’ve cancer that affects the lymph glands, the spleens and liver what we call the lymphoma, that’s number two. And then we have the one that affects the back of the eye called retinoblastoma. Then we’ve cancers that affect the kidneys. So those are the top 4 but cancer can happen anywhere in the body and doesn’t matter whether you’re a child or adult. The difference is that, in children, we can treat to cure and in children, it’s very aggressive and could kill very fast”, he disclosed.
Records have it that, due to the high cost of cancer treatment, many parents of afflicted children usually have no or little hope of survival of their children but medical experts say children with cancer have a relatively high survival rate if the cases are reported very early for treatment.
It was to offer hope to both parents and children afflicted with the condition that a US-based non-profit organization, ‘Wis4Life Foundation’ offered to visit the Pediatric Oncology Unit of the KATH to provide moral and spiritual upliftment as well as material support.
Fifty mothers each received a package made up of slippers, towel, plates, cup, cutlery sets and toiletries while the Pediatric Oncology Unit was given 20 pieces of brand new Computer Tablets with learning materials for cancer patients on their visit.
The delegation of the ‘Wish4Life Foundation’ also led the patients and their mothers in prayer in seeking divine healing of their affliction.
The Founder of the ‘Wish4Life Foundation’, Dr. Tanya Trippett, disclosed that, the first-ever Oncology and International Children’s Cancer Research Centre being built at Asikan in the Eastern region by her Foundation at a cost of $250 million to be completed in 2027, will advance research and care for cancer in sub-Saharan Africa with the highest possible care in the disease to offer hope to, particularly children.
According to her, “The plan is to build a large complex that will help in the study and to ensure that, we give appropriate care to the children in addition to the state-of-the-art equipment and medications.”
Earlier, Dr. Trippett and her team called on the Chief Executive Officer of the KATH, Professor Yaw Okyere Addai Mensah. The CEO warned that, with the acute congestion situation being experienced at the Hospital, child patients could be the worst affected if conscious concerted measures are not put in place to protect their needs.
