A woman diagnosed with kidney cancer resigned herself to her fate as she could not afford treatment – until the Malta Community Chest Fund stepped in.
“I was told I had a tumour in my kidneys in 2007. After one of them was removed, I was told I had to start treatment, which we could not afford because it cost thousands of euros every month,” Antoinette Degabriele said yesterday, moments before the charity fund was established as a foundation.
Ms Degabriele continued: “When I told my husband that we had to leave things in God’s hands, he did not want to give up and sought help from the MCCF.”
Still receiving treatment, she was one of three women who spoke yesterday of how the MCCF was a “shoulder they could lean on”.
The fund, which has now become a foundation, will be reaching out to those who shy away from asking for help, President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca said at the ceremony launching the foundation.
“Our aim is that the MCCF not only offers help to those who know about the foundation but also reaches out to others, through entities such as the local councils and the college of parish priests, because not everyone comes forward, despite their needs,” the President said.
The transformation into a foundation means that the MCCF can now enrol with the Registrar for Legal Persons, something it could not do as a fund.
Turning the MCCF into a foundation was one of Ms Coleiro Preca’s wishes from the time she was appointed President, in a bid to give the fund more exposure and accountability.
Eventually, units within the foundation might be set up that could register under the Voluntary Organisations Act, Ms Coleiro Preca told this newspaper.
The new set-up means the MCCF will now have a supervision board in charge of policy, an administration board that takes care of implementation and a third, consultative board.
The foundation will also have other specialised units that will take care of, among other things, ethics, medical help, social assistance for disabled people and research and prevention.
Following a minute of silence in remembrance of the migrants who perished in the Mediterranean in recent days, President Coleiro Preca said the Maltese had a big heart.
They had sent thousands of flowers to the morgue, in solidarity with people they did not even know. And MCCF was made from Maltese people’s generosity, she said of the fund, which in over a year has handed out more than €2 million in aid.
One of the beneficiaries said if it were not for MCCF, she would not have been able to accompany her son to Switzerland. He had to travel there 48 times for treatment.
Maryrose Farrugia spoke of her son Samuel, who at two was diagnosed with cancer in his eyes. He was transferred for treatment from the UK to Switzerland and by the time he turned five, he had lost both eyes.
President Coleiro Preca said no one chose to be sick, poor or vulnerable, and there were families who toyed with the idea of selling their family house to make ends meet and fund treatments.
She urged people who work in the community to contact the MCCF if they knew of any people in need.
Aid in numbers
Between April 2014 and March 2015, the Malta Community Chest Fund spent:
• €1,097,650 for chemotherapy, which is not provided by the state;
• €302,283 for other specialised medicine;
• €295,831 for relatives to accompany a sick person abroad;
• €254,146 for medical equipment, including mobility aids and custom-made wheelchairs;
• €119,726 in social aid, including food vouchers and white goods.