The Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) has granted approval for its isolation ward, at the Rebecca Akufo-Addo Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) for infectious children to be renamed after the late Childhood Cancer Ambassador, Breanna Fosua Addai.
Late Breanna Fosua Addai, died at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital at age nine after battling with an Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia disease for two years on August 3, 2022.
Following her death, the Breanna Memorial Childhood Cancer Foundation, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) was established in her memory.
The Executive Director of the foundation, Mr Solomon Addai, in an interview with the Ghanaian Times, in Accra, yesterday on the sidelines of the commemoration of International Childhood Cancer Day, explained that the adoption of the ward was to support children on admission financially through payment of some of their laboratory tests, service charge among others.
He said payment for such services put a lot of financial burden on the parents of the children, “so our effort is to support and also pay for maintenance cost to ensure the ward remained in good condition.”
“When little Breanna was alive, she was mostly admitted to the isolation ward at Rebecca Akufo-Addo PICU for intensive care and wished that her NGO, adopt the ward to be named after her so that children living with cancer benefit from the facility,” he added.
Mr Addai said, the foundation would also support children who were usually transferred from the Oncology Unit of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital to the ward for intensive care with GH¢100,000 every year through its activities.
As part of the ceremony, Mr Addai donated GH¢3,000 to support children living with cancer at the Paediatric Oncology Unit as the world commemorated International Childhood Cancer Day.
Mr Addai called on individuals and civil society organisations to help raise funds and support children living with cancer in the country.
Dr Ernestina Schandorf, an Oncologist who received the donation on behalf of the Head of Child Health Department at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Professor Lorna Awo Renner expressed her gratitude to Breanna Memorial Childhood Cancer Foundation for the support.
She said the donation would go a long way to support the children and alleviate some of their plights as their treatment was costive.
“We’re so much grateful and pray the foundation succeeds so that the children will have a better facility for treatment,” she added.
Late Breanna until her death advocated a lot of interventions to be carried out for children with cancer in the country.
Some of her calls were the incorporation of childhood cancers into the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), which was successfully facilitated by the First Lady, Mrs Rebecca Akufo-Addo.
She also, made an appeal to international leaders to intervene for a ceasefire during the war between Russia and Ukraine, to help save the lives of children with cancer in Ukraine.
Her plea was considered as more than 20 Ukrainian children with cancer were airlifted to the United Kingdom to undergo lifesaving cancer treatment on the National Health Service (NHS).
BY VIVIAN ARTHUR
