China is aiming to offer free medical treatment to
30,000?disabled orphans within three years.
The "Tomorrow Plan", funded by the Ministry of Civil Affairs
(MCA), a three-year project that started in 2004, aims to give
30,000 disabled orphans free operations.
There are approximately 66,000 orphans and abandoned babies
living in welfare homes nationwide and about half of them are
disabled.
"We have decided to extend aid to more disabled children, whose
families can not afford to pay for the operations," said Dou Yupei,
vice minister of Civil Affairs, when visiting hospitals that will
perform the operations.
So far, about 16,000 disabled orphans have received surgery and
rehabilitation. Compared with the country's total number of 573,000
orphans, with a large number of disabled ones yet to be counted,
there is a lot of work to be done.
(Xinhua News Agency June 1, 2006)