Over 9,000 children to benefit from Red Cross heart screening program in Xinjiang

BEIJING -- The Chinese Red Cross Foundation (CRCF) is set to complete its 2025 "Angels Tour," a large-scale congenital heart disease screening campaign in Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, Northwest China, by May, with more than 9,000 children expected to be examined, the organization said Wednesday.

Scheduled from March through May, the initiative has seen several volunteer medical teams tour various parts of Xinjiang, conducting free screenings for children with suspected congenital heart conditions.

In the latest leg of the project, the foundation is working in regions including Altay and Tacheng, in collaboration with a volunteer medical team from a hospital in Shandong province, East China.

The team will carry out screenings at eight locations and conduct follow-up checkups for children who received surgery in previous years. This round of screening is expected to continue through mid-April.

According to Yang Zhuozi, director of the CRCF's medical assistance department, the Angels Tour has occurred annually in Xinjiang since 2017, with support from the central authority's special lottery public welfare fund and charitable donations from the public.

To date, the program has screened more than 21,000 children across the region and provided free corrective surgeries for over 2,300 children diagnosed with operable heart defects.