THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Union Minister of State for Tourism, Petroleum and Natural Gas Suresh Gopi visited the second campus of the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology (RGCB) at Aakkulam and promised support for the proposed cancer hospital there.
The minister agreed to take up the proposal with Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare J P Nadda and Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
RGCB director Dr Chandrabhas Narayana briefed the minister on the RGCB’s proposal to develop a 150 to 200-bed referral hospital in the PPP model for cancer patients, especially those needing palliative care. The project envisaged as a facility with ICU-convertible beds, is estimated to cost Rs 400 crore.
The minister also extended support for the development of the campus into a hub of advanced medical research and development.
Gopi said he would discuss measures to expedite the project with Union Minister for Science and Technology and Minister of Health Sciences Jitendra Singh. He also planted a flowering tree on the campus and named it ‘Kasturba.’
Suresh Gopi and Narayana also discussed the potential of medical tourism in the state. “Medical tourism, which currently concentrates on traditional medicine, can be further augmented by providing patients with facilities for baseline tests like regular blood parameters and high-end proteomics, metabolomics, genomics etc. The Ministry of Tourism could extend all support for carrying forward this initiative,” said Narayana.
The duo also discussed the health of tribal communities and possible interventions to be made to address genetic health issues found among them.