Plane load of 21 Ukrainian children with cancer arrives in Britain so they can get life-saving treatment
A PLANE of 21 Ukrainian children with cancer has arrived in Britain so they can get life-saving treatment.
The sick youngsters, ranging from babies to teenagers, will be assessed and given vital NHS care in hospitals for free.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid ordered a jet to bring them to the UK after Putin’s invasion closed down their hospital and cut them off from vital treatment, The Sun revealed last week.
Mr Javid said: “I am proud that the UK is offering lifesaving medical care to these Ukrainian children.
“I know that the incredible staff in the NHS will ensure they get the best possible care.
“I am hugely grateful to everyone involved in helping these children and their families here.”
The children and their immediate family members landed in England yesterday evening from Poland.
NHS clinicians will assess them to understand their needs before they are sent to hospitals in England to continue their care.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson added that the UK will “continue to do all we can to support them as they continue their critical treatment here”.
Poland had already taken in many children needing healthcare from Ukraine.
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It called on other countries to help provide additional care as more children crossed the border from Ukraine.
UK ministers worked with their counterparts in Kyiv to fast-track visas for the kids to save their lives.
They also partnered with non-profit American organisation St Jude Children’s Research hospital, which specialises in paediatric diseases, to arrange an urgent flight for the kids.
The Department for Health and Social Care would not reveal the airport the children landed in for safeguarding reasons.
A health source told The Sun on Wednesday: “We are urgently making plans to evacuate a number of children and their families to the UK where they will be looked after and receive NHS treatment for their conditions.”
The Government has also sent seven aircrafts to Ukraine to deliver more than 650,000 medical items including wound care packs, intensive care equipment and vital medicines.
It comes after at least 17 people were wounded after a Russian airstrike destroyed a maternity hospital in the besieged city of Mariupol, Ukraine has claimed.
President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed children were left buried under the rubble after the strike on Wednesday afternoon and branded the attack an “atrocity”.
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