China has launched a program aiming at helping patients with rare disease in diagnosis and treatment and offering financial support to those in need.
"The cost of treatment and care throws a lot of families into poverty. But what is more desperate yet, is that people often simply don't know what took their loved one's life," said Wang Yiou, head of the Illness Challenge Foundation, who lives with brittle-bone disease.
The program, which was launched Wednesday, will be sponsored by the Illness Challenge and China Social Assistance foundations. It will help with diagnosis and treatment of up to 100 diseases.