In spite of the campaign for the proposed cancer centre in the district gaining momentum recently, the Chief Minister Ommen Chandy’s recent assurances of setting up the centre in the government sector contained no concrete plans about it.
Although the foundation stone for the centre was laid in August 2014 on the Government Medical College campus at Kalamassery with a promise to complete it within two years, the nine months lull afterwards has raised apprehensions about its progress.
The campaigners of V.R. Krishna Iyer Movement for Cancer Centre in Kochi had also met the Chief Minister here but “there is no new development”, said Dr. N.K. Sanil Kumar, one of the campaigners.
Regional Cancer Centre in Thiruvananthapuram remains the only fully equipped hospital in the public sector while most government medical colleges across the state that get a large number of cancer patients are unable to provide the best treatment to the patients, said a radiation oncologist in a government medical college.
Malabar Cancer Centre is another institute that is planned to come up almost in the same manner as RCC, but it has to go a long way still, said the radiation oncologist.
The government had appointed oncologist Dr V.P. Gangadharan as special officer, technical expertise, for the cancer centreThe proposed cancer centre is expected to cost Rs. 450 crore.
