UAE promises donation to Magdi Yacoub’s heart hospital in Egypt

CAIRO – 31 January 2020: Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, ruler of Dubai, said the income of the show of the third round of the Arab Hope Makers initiative will be sent to Egyptian British retired Professor Magdi Yacoub’s charitable hospital for treating heart diseases in Egypt.

“The purpose is that the party (show) creates a new hope for thousands of hearts that need care,” Mohammed bin Rashid, also vice president and prime minister said in a Tweet.

Yacoub last year said that the foundation stone of a heart center in Cairo will be laid soon. The center will provide cardiac care.

In an interview with Egypt Today, the cardiothoracic surgeon said that an inauguration ceremony of the Cairo center, and will be attended by a large number of parliamentarians, senior doctors and statesmen to support the center and urge Egyptians to donate.

The Magdi Yacoub Global Heart Foundation launched a campaign in May to raise fund for the new center.

A set of remarkable scientists and public figures took part in the campaign such as Professor Magdy Ishak, and Egyptian Ambassador to the United States Yasser Reda, among others.

The Magdi Yacoub Global Heart Foundation supports Aswan heart centre in Upper Egypt and is raising funds for the future Magdi Yacoub global heart center in Cairo.

Besides providing urgently needed cardiac care, the centers impact the region and continent by advancing scientific understanding through research and building human health capacities with training programs.

The new center will cost an estimate of $150 million and will include 300 beds, hence expected to upgrade network care capacity from 33,000 to 140,000 outpatients and from 4,000 to 17,000 inpatients annually.

Moreover, the training capacity will grow from 550 to over 2300, dramatically increasing the sector’s workforce.

Yacoub was among the first three surgeons to perform an open heart surgery in Nigeria in 1974. In 1986, he was part of the team that developed the techniques of the heart-lung transplantation at the National Heart and Lung Institute.

He also led a British research team at Harefield hospital in 2007, aiming to grow a part of the human heart using stem cells. These efforts were all exerted in order to overcome the shortage of heart transplant donations.