A 34-year-old Bangladeshi migrant worker, who was diagnosed with advanced stomach cancer in April 2020, has returned home safely to see his family.

S$51,018 raised

To help Sikdar Rana see his family for possibly the last time, the Migrant Workers' Assistance Fund (MWAF), the charity branch of the Migrant Workers' Centre (MWC), started a campaign on giving.sg to raise the funds required to complete his medical evacuation to Bangladesh from Singapore.

As of Monday morning (May 25), S$51,018 has been raised from 427 donors.

While the medical evacuation was estimated to cost about S$48,000, the fundraising target was set at S$60,000 for any excess to fund the needs that may come to help support his return home, MWAF said on the fundraising page.

Any unused amount from the campaign will be channelled to the charity to help benefit other migrant workers.

First asked for euthanasia

According to Cynthia Goh, a doctor on the palliative care team that took care of Sikdar while he was in Singapore, Sikdar first asked for euthanasia when he heard that the cancer had "spread everywhere", and that no cancer treatment was possible. 

Goh, who is a Senior Consultant in the Division of Supportive & Palliative Care at the National Cancer Centre Singapore, said her team then started preparing for his travel back to Dhaka on May 19. 

Sikdar was "sustained by the hope" of seeing his six-year-old son back home, she said.

Everyone they approached helped

However, the plans hit a roadblock when Bangladesh went into lockdown on May 17, and the lockdown would not be lifted until May 30.

Goh did not think Sikdar could wait as he was being sustained by intravenous (IV) feeding and antibiotics at the time, and he would "probably have only a few days" if he stops in Dhaka.

A nurse on her team then suggested the possibility of crowd funding to get Sikdar back home by medical evacuation.

While they did not know how to go about doing it, Goh contacted a friend who linked them up with the MWC.

MWC, who "quickly took up this cause", managed to secure two donors to underwrite the amount needed for the medical evacuation to get started.

Crowd funding was then started to secure the rest of the funds needed to complete the process.

Thereafter, the team had to overcome many "obstacles", such as Covid-19 testing for the pilots, and obtaining landing permission in Bangladesh, which had stopped all international flights.

To top it off, these were done over the long weekend of Aidilfitri when most offices were closed "from Friday till the end of the Eid holidays".

But everyone the team approached helped readily, from the Bangladeshi High Commission to the Bangladeshi Civil Aviation Authority, Goh said.

Crowdfunding started about 24 hours before Sikdar got home

Sikdar eventually left Singapore General Hospital on the night of May 22, and was admitted to the Centre for Palliative Care at the Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU).

He was then reunited with his family for Aidilfitri after getting discharged on Saturday afternoon, May 23.

Amazingly, the crowdfunding campaign was only started a little over 24 hours before Sikdar got home, Goh marvelled, adding that it was her privilege to be part of this effort to send him home.

Top image adapted via Bangladeshi local news