According to The Lancet study, nearly 50,000 Indian children up to the age of 19 suffer from cancer each year, and around 20,000 children remain undiagnosed and untreated. Apart from the lack of resources and facilities available in many cities of the country, Pediatric Oncology involves high cost. This is a major reason why many children either remain untreated or do not receive proper treatment and drop out of it mid-way. To do its bit to support pediatric oncology patients, create awareness about cancer in India and empower Indians to fight against the disease,  the YouWeCan Foundation (YWC) recently partnered with AIIMS, New Delhi. 

The YWC Foundation, established by Indian Cricketer Yuvraj Singh – a cancer survivor himself, is a non-profit organization working with the mission to empower Indians from all backgrounds to defeat cancer and with this goal in mind, it extended support to AIIMS in the treatment of underprivileged pediatric oncology patients. The YWC Foundation believes that the key to fighting cancer in India lies in better awareness, more screening and in providing support & assistance to patients throughout and after their treatment including scholarships to cancer survivor children. 

The cause is immensely close to the YWC Foundation, and hence the organization is striving to make continuous efforts to impact the lives of children suffering from cancer. The team and its Chief Impact Officer Mr. Jitten Veer Singh have been relentlessly working with the team at AIIMS and created a consensus considering all ethical and administrative guidelines. Shabnam Singh, Chairperson, YouWeCan Foundation said, “The cause that the Foundation works towards is extremely personal to all of us. The simple lack of awareness around cancer is unfortunate, and this shows up when you see the recovery rate among children, especially children who belong from families that do not have the financial resources and/or the access to proper facilities. We hope that through this initiative, we are able to bring a positive change in the lives of children and their parents”.

 Dr. D. K. Sharma, Medical Superintendent, AIIMS – New Delhi expressed his pleasure and said, “I am glad that altruistic people from society are taking initiatives to help needy patients. We appreciate the foundation for this help which will certainly support many poor patients in the future.” 

The first underprivileged child to receive treatment under this partnership was suffering from blood cancer. Dr. Himangi Verma, Manager – Projects handed over a cheque of INR 5 Lakh for the child’s treatment to Mr. B. R. Shekhar, Chief Medical Social Service Officer and Mr. Vivek Kumar Singh, Medical Social Service Officer in Medical Social Welfare Unit, AIIMS on 14th January, 2020. As of today, the child is XXX

Mr. B. R. Shekhar said, “Government has wonderful schemes to support poor patients for their treatment and still it is always beneficial to get help from other agencies as we all work for healthcare as a team. This new association with YWC Foundation would be a great support for pediatric oncology patients.”

Till date we have screened over 1,50,000 people for different forms of cancer, sensitized over 1,25,000 students through anti-tobacco workshops, and supported the complete education expenses of 150 young cancer survivors. In 2019-20, we launched our Cancer Treatment Fund for Pediatric Patients and sponsored the cancer treatment of 40 children from underprivileged backgrounds.