KOCHI: State Human Rights Commission chairman Justice J B Koshy whose term is coming to an end next month, said on Thursday that the State Government should not delay opening of the Kochi Cancer Centre outpatient (OP) wing and should present it to the people as an Onam gift. “I had visited the OP and the infrastructure and equipment are ready. The former District Collector M G Rajamanickam told me that 31 cancer specialists are ready to come there. Post three or four of them at the centre and start the OP,” Justice Koshy said while addressing a meeting organised by the Justice V R Krishna Iyer Movement seeking steps to realise the centre and improve facilities at the Ernakulam Government Medical College (EMC).
Justice Koshy said that the bureaucracy was placing hurdles in the way of realizing the cancer centre by delaying files and even the Health Minister would find it difficult to overcome them. “There are private hospitals in Kochi city which do not want the cancer centre to come up and they have a ready ally in the bureaucracy,” he said. “When an ordinary man or woman goes to a private hospital with the disease, he will have to spend his entire earnings while the family turns bankrupt and hence the importance of centres in the public sector,” he reminded the government, adding all such spaces should be disabled-friendly also.
Justice Koshy said that Ernakulam needed to have a better Government Medical College. “It is the district that gives the top revenue to the state’s coffers while Kottayam, a relatively small town, has a better medical college,” Justice Koshy pointed out. EMC Principal Dr V K Sreekala in her address said that more land was needed for the development of the cancer centre along with the EMC on the same campus. She also said that everything was in place except oncologists to start the cancer centre OP.
Former MP and CPM district secretary P Rajeev said that a massive clean-up of the EMC campus with public involvement would be held on August 25 while the Governing Council meeting of the Cancer Centre on August 29 would initiate the works. MLA P.T. Thomas, Prof M.K. Sanu, Fr Davis Chirammel, K.R. Viswambharan, among others, spoke on the occasion. The meeting was convened on the occasion of the second anniversary of the foundation stone laying for the cancer centre
