Child hematology center opens in St. Petersburg

ST.  PETERSBURG.  Sept 20 (Interfax) - The opening ceremony for the
center of   child  hematology  and  transplantology  named  after  Raisa
Gorbachev was held in St. Petersburg on Thursday.
     "We decided that an international forum of children's hematologists
be set up  on  the  basis  of  this  center so that they can convene and
discuss  problems  related to child hematology," former Soviet President
Mikhail Gorbachev said.
     Speaking  at  the ceremony, Gorbachev thanked everyone who assisted
in creating  the  center  and  vowed that the Gorbachev Foundation would
continue to provide support.
     St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko promised that the city
would also  provide  support.  "A hundred children in St. Petersburg and
5,000 in  Russia  are diagnosed with leucosis each year. By opening this
center, we are giving them hope," she said.
     The  center  has  been  under  construction since May 27, 2002, and
since 2005 it has been financed mainly from the federal budget.
     About  100  children  and teenagers under 15 are annually diagnosed
with leucosis  in  St.  Petersburg, and some 5,000 such cases a year are
recorded among children up to 18 in Russia.
     Raisa Gorbachev died at 67 of a severe form of leucosis in a German
clinic on September 20, 1999.