Earlier this year, Harvard Medical School’s Paul Farmer, co-founder of Partners In Health (left), was joined by former President Bill Clinton (right) marking the new Mirebalais Hospital in Haiti. On July 18, Clinton rejoined Farmer for the inauguration of the Butaro Cancer Center of Excellence in Rwanda. The Clinton Global Initiative partnered with others to sponsor the first national cancer referral facility in rural Rwanda.

Courtesy of Partners In Health

Health

Cancer care comes to Rwanda

2 min read

Harvard affiliates join in opening of first cancer referral facility

“Just a few years ago we had no system or financing mechanism to diagnose and treat AIDS in Africa. People said it was too expensive or too complicated,” said Paul Farmer, chair of Harvard Medical School’s Department of Global Health and Social Medicine and co-founder of Partners In Health (PIH). “But today nearly 7 million people in developing countries are receiving treatment for HIV. We can do the same with cancer.”

Representatives from Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center and PIH, and the Jeff Gordon Children’s Foundation and Ministry of Health of the Republic of Rwanda will be on hand at today’s official opening of the Butaro Cancer Center of Excellence, which will serve as the first national cancer referral facility in rural Rwanda.

Former President Bill Clinton, who helped bring together this partnership through his Clinton Global Initiative, will inaugurate the center today, on the same site at which he laid the cornerstone for Butaro Hospital in 2008.

The Butaro Cancer Center of Excellence, located within Butaro Hospital in northern rural Rwanda, will provide a full spectrum of cancer care including screening, diagnosis, chemotherapy, surgery, patient follow-up, and palliative care. It will also serve as the first facility to implement standardized cancer training and protocols that align with Rwanda’s new national guidelines.

Farmer is the Kolokotrones University Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School.