The Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare is working on a scheme to provide free treatment of breast and uterine cancer.

The scheme which is taken as an ambitious one will be enforced in cooperation with the Ministry of Health and it is likely to be included in the upcoming budget. Currently, the Health Ministry gives financial assistance of Rs 100,000 each to a cancer patient.

Minister for Women, Children and Social Welfare Kumar Khadka shared information about this in a meeting of the Legislature-Parliament, Women, Children, Senior Citizens and Social Welfare Committee on Thursday. He said the Ministry was calculating the cost that it has to bear to provide free treatment to the patients of breast and uterine cancer before finalizing the scheme.

The World Health Organization (WHO) chart shows that every year 4000 new patients of breast and uterine cancer appear in Nepal.

Khadka briefed the meeting that biopsy test of all women would be conducted by female health workers to find out if their bodies carried the syndromes of these two types of cancer and this service was likely to come in force very soon. The Ministry has demanded additional budget from the Ministry of Finance to launch this service. The Ministry had already consulted with the embassies of US, China, Australia and Denmark here and UN Women, Nepal about the issue.

Speaking at the meeting, Khadka said the provision of compulsorily providing 10 percent of income to biological parents was forthcoming. The process to amend the Senior Citizens Act was nearing final stage which would also bar parents from transferring all their properties to their children’s names.

Likewise, preparations were on to revise the Gender Violence Prevention Fund Operation Regulations and to amend the Social Welfare Act and the Children Act, as stated by the Minister.

The purpose of amending the Social Welfare Act is to clip on the tendency of unnecessary administrative expenses of the national and international non-government organizations.

Lawmakers Ratnadevi Gurung, Dinesh Chandra Yadav, TL Chaudhary, Ranjana Shrestha and Anuradha Thapa demanded an increment in the budget meant for the welfare of women, children and older people and in the social security funds.

Committee President Ranju Kumari Jha urged the government to execute the committee directives. RSS