This Janmashtami, sponsor milk for kids with cancer

Handing over medicines, doctors often warn, "Don't take them on empty stomach". Yet, while treatment for cancer receives a lot of donations, nutritional needs of children have been ignored for far too long. Cuddles Foundation has joined hands with the Tata Memorial Centre (TMC) to provide nutrition to all the children undergoing cancer treatment along with starting a lassi and butter programme.

"Around two-thirds of the children coming to us are already malnourished. Bodies of such children cannot bear the rigours of chemotheraphy and many leave treatment mid-way," said Dr Brijesh Arora, professor in Pediatric Oncology, Tata Memorial Centre.

Malnourished children with cancer are five times more likely to die during treatment.

Purnota Dutta Bahl of the Cuddles Foudation, talking about her involvement said, "While many are ready to donate towards cancer treatment, the nutrition aspect is often ignored. This is 5% of the costs but the results are 10 folds."

Currently, the nutrition programme is run in 17 different hospitals across seven cities. While it has been around for three years in some hospitals, the latest addition is the lassi and butter programme.

"This is my favourite as children love to drink lassi. We give them butter to simply lick or they can eat it with chapati. These items are cheap but they make a lot of difference to the children. Anybody can support the nutrition programme," said Bahl. "In fact, donating lassi to children on Janmashtami would be ideal," she added.

Earlier 25% of the children would abandon treatment midway but following the nutrition programme it has now dropped to less than 5%.