PESHAWAR: A memorandum of understanding (MoU) is to be signed between the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH) today (Wednesday) at 11am.
The ceremony will be held in the hospital building where UN refugee agency representative Ruvendrini Menikdiwela and SKMCH Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr Faisal Sultan will sign the document. Federal Minister for States and Frontier Regions Abdul Qadir Baloch, Provincial Minister for Health Shahram Khan Tarakai, and Chief Commissioner for Afghan Refugees Saleem Khan are expected to attend the ceremony.
Whereas senior management of the UNHCR and the Shaukat Khanum Hospital will also be there. As per this MoU, UNHCR will provide state-of-the-art cancer cure treatment machines to the hospital including two Linear Accelerators (high energy) Varian Vital Beam, one CT Simulator 4D Toshiba Aquiline Machine, Varian ARIA 15 (Eclipse) Treatment Planning System, Peripherals (immobilisations, PTW Dosimetry).
These equipment’s are expected to cost up to 8,150,000 US dollars. These machines equip the Shaukat Khanum Hospital with the latest technology in cancer treatment. In Peshawar, the hospital is facing rapid increase in patient turn over with the 40% escalation from the previous year.
Besides the residents, the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is hosting a large number of the refugees from Afghanistan and this memorandum will definitely increase the capacity of the hospital to treat more patients even from the refugees.
