Sibling of Blood Cancer Patient Appeals Delhi High Court for Free Treatment At AIIMS

Delhi High Court, India, recently heard an appeal from a family member of a blood cancer patient requesting All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) to provide him free and continuous treatment.

The plea said 30-year-old Satish has been undergoing chemotherapy at the AIIMS and his family has already spent around Rs.3 lakh on treatment.

The plea by Satish's brother Anand Kumar Morya, filed through advocate Ashok Aggarwal said Satish, a resident of Mathura who used to run a photocopy-cum-lamination shop, was diagnosed with Burkitt's Leukemia, a form of blood cancer.

Satish's father, a class-IV railway employee with a monthly salary of Rs.12,000 was now the sole earning member in a family of six. Due to the disease Satish has shut down his business and sold the machines to bear the treatment cost. The patient's father has exhausted all his savings on the treatment, and even his Provident Fund account is left with a meager balance of Rs.24,550.

"They (the family) have been given an additional expenditure estimate of Rs.6 lakh recently, which they are unable to bear. The petition thus seeks continuation of treatment at AIIMS free of cost in order to save Satish's life," it said.

The plea said the family was not in a position to bear the expenditure and, under such circumstances, Satish's chemotherapy was likely to get interrupted and discontinuation of treatment would lead to an anomalous situation by reversing the gains of treatment already given and ultimately endangering the patient's life.

Pointing out that Satish has been responding well to the treatment and his condition has improved, the plea said the family had, requested free continuation of treatment to the director of AIIMS, but no response has been received so far.

Source: Medindia