7,440 ill children helped by public welfare lottery fund in 2017

BEIJING, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese Red Cross Foundation (CRCF) has helped 7,440 impoverished children with serious illnesses via the public welfare lottery fund in 2017, the CRCF said in a statement Friday.

A total of 5,596 children suffer from leukemia, while 1,844 children have congenital heart diseases.

Another 460 children with either of the two diseases were aided by social funds via related programs.

A total of 215 million yuan (32.57 million U.S. dollars) of the public welfare lottery fund has been spent on aid this year, with more than 26 million yuan of social funds raised at the same time, the statement said.

In China, part of the public welfare lottery fund is extracted from lottery sales revenue. Prize money that is not cashed in also goes to the fund.

The CRCF also launched a campaign in nine provinces this year to carry out screening and preliminary examination of over 350,000 impoverished children, more than a thousand of whom were diagnosed with congenital heart disease. Nearly 600 of those diagnosed have successfully undergone surgery, according to the CRCF. Enditem