'Bhabhatron'- a step in realizing Bhabha's vision for cancer radiotherapy

Currently there is a huge shortfall in the availability of Radiotherapy equipment in the entire developing world. While in the developed countries there are 2-4 teletherapy machines available per million population considering the prevailing socio-economic conditions, the WHO has recommended 1 teletherapy unit per million population for the developing countries to provide essential cancer services. There are several developing countries, which do not have a single teletherapy machine and most others fall way short of the WHO recommendation of one machine per million population. The number of new teletherapy machine installation in India has increased rapidly in the last 5 years. However with approximately 400 teletherapy units existing for a population of over a billion, we still need another 800 teletherapy machines to reach a very modest target of 1 machine per million population. Among other reasons the cost of the imported teletherapy equipment is one of the important deterrent towards fulfilling this huge shortfall of 800 teletherapy units in our country. 'Bhabhatron' can be considered a small but significant step in the whole programme of 'Atoms for Peace'