Lee (left) receives the RM50,000 donation from Bong, who is the relative of the anonymous donor.
MIRI: The Malaysian Red Crescent (MRC) Miri Chapter is still short of RM3.2 million to build a dialysis centre in Permyjaya.
Assistant Minister of Communications Datuk Lee Kim Shin disclosed that some RM1.8 million was raised during a Chinese New Year celebration cum fund-raising dinner on March 12 for the purpose.
As such, he would want to seek support from the public in realising the dream of having a second dialysis centre here.
“For now, we are in the midst of submitting a building plan after it was approved by Land and Survey Department. There are still a lot of procedures that we have to settle and we are confident that by the second half of this year, the construction project can commence,” he told reporters here yesterday.
On the current MRC Miri dialysis centre, Lee said it had 316 patients, with 23 people in the waiting list.
“The increasing cases of kidney disease have been very worrying. We hope to complete the new dialysis centre so that the patients in the waiting list would not need to wait too long for treatment,” he said, adding that the new centre would require 40 new dialysis machines.
Meanwhile, Lee — who is also vice chairman of MRC Miri — took the opportunity to unveil two new haemodiafiltration machines for special-case patients, such as those too young or too old for the normal kidney transplant.
“Though the machine is more expensive than the ordinary variety, we are delighted because with these machines, we can provide treatment to various groups of patients suffering from kidney disease.”
Yesterday, Lee on behalf of Miri MRC received RM50,000 from an anonymous donor, who was represented by a relative, Bong Poh Hian.
Lee thanked the donor and was pleased that the person was eager to help the less-fortunate.
“More than 90 per cent of those undergoing treatment at our centre need subsidy as they cannot bear the full cost of
dialysis treatment. They are the very people who are in need of generous help from members of the public,” he remarked.