Qatar Red Crescent (QRCS) has delivered cancer medication to Yemen’s National Oncology Centre. The medical supplies, worth  $118,630, were donated by Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC).
Dr Abdul-Wahab al-Nahmi, director of National Oncology Centre, thanked QRCS and Qatar for the support, as the centre suffers from shortages in many chemotherapy medicines.
“Thousands of cancer patients have difficulty finding their prescriptions. Good luck for QRCS in its humanitarian work in Yemen,” he said.
The lone government cancer hospital in Sanaa, the centre is the “only hope for the families of patients, who can never afford to send their children abroad for treatment”, according to a press statement.
Since its establishment in 2005, the National Oncology Centre has diagnosed and treated more than 60,000 patients. The need for the centre has become more significant than ever for Yemen due to the lack of available cancer care outside the capital.
The lack of availability of medicines and diagnostic supplies is a direct result of the war. Pharmaceutical merchants and the humanitarian sector have not been able to import the much-needed supplies in the quantities required.
In addition, the collapsing economy has meant that budgets across the government sector have been stretched to a point that the centre has been unable to meet even basic running costs. The centre was at a point where its closure seemed like the only option, the World Health Organisation warned.
A few months ago, QRCS delivered a donation from Qatar’s Ministry of Public Health to the National Cancer Control Foundation’s Al-Amal Oncology Centre in Taiz. Consisting of 13 types of effective medications, the donation benefited more than 370 cancer patients.