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Tribune News Network
Doha
Even though Saudi Arabia and its allies have imposed a blockade on Qatar, Doha is continuing to offer its world-class healthcare services to patients from those countries.
More than 10,000 patients from the blockading countries Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Egypt ” have been receiving treatment at various hospitals in Qatar ever since the Gulf crisis broke out on June 5.
Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) has received more than 4,000 patients and the Primary Health Care Corporation (PHCC) centres about 6,000 patients from the blockading countries since the beginning of the crisis, according to a source.
All the patients have been receiving treatment as per the policies prevailing before the crisis. The blockade has nothing do with it, the source added.
Most prominent patients among them include a Bahraini expat receiving treatment for kidney failure at Hamad Bin Jassim Centre and a Saudi woman receiving treatment at National Center for Cancer Care and Research, according to Al Watan.
The PHCC has said it will continue to provide its services to patients from the four countries irrespective of the blockade.
Similarly, the Qatar Cancer Society (QCS) has confirmed that it would continue its charitable and humanitarian work by standing with the needy and sick by covering the treatment cost for all the expatriates whether at Hamad General Hospital or at the National Center for Cancer Care.
The QCS said unfair decisions were taken by the blockading countries to prevent some Qatari citizens from receiving treatment in those countries.
QCS Chairman HE Sheikh Khalid bin Jabor al Thani said the Gulf crisis will never stop the organisation from bearing the cost of cancer treatment for residents who are unable to afford it. He said the QCS covered the cost of treating 400 cancer patients, some of them from the blockading countries in 2016.
The QCS Chairman pointed out that it does not have a single patient on the waiting list.
He said cancer patients from the blockading countries are still benefiting from the financial support provided by QCS in Doha.
According to the National Human Rights Committee, the measures taken by Saudi Arabia and its allies have not exempted the sick, pregnant women, children or persons with disabilities from Qatar and prevented them from completing treatment at their hospitals.
Recently, the Human Rights Watch reported the case of Amany, a Qatari woman, whose 15-year-old daughter underwent a brain surgery in February. The girl was supposed to undergo another surgery in Riyadh on June 17 but it didn't happen due to travel restrictions imposed on Qataris.
