#ThrowbackThursday: Yuvraj Singh’s Journey from Aiding Cancer to COVID Patients

Former Indian cricketer Yuvraj Singh was an all-rounder and was into left-handed batting. He has the experience of playing more than 400 matches for India and gained his name for his good fielding and aggressive stroke play of the ball. From being a member of the Indian cricket team in One Day Internationals (ODIs) between 2000-17, getting the Vice-Captain position in Indian ODI between 2007-08, being Man of the Tournament in the 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup, becoming one of the top performers at the 2007 ICC World T20, hitting six sixes in one over and setting the record for the fastest fifty in T20 Internationals and all T20 cricket at the 2007 World T20, to becoming the first player to take a five-wicket haul and score a 50 in 2011 World Cup match, Singh’s journey has been quite eventful.

After that, his life took a drastic turn in 2011. He was diagnosed with a cancerous tumor in his left lung, for which he went to Boston and Indianapolis to get chemotherapy treatment. After completing the third and final cycle of chemotherapy, he returned to India in April 2012. Playing against New Zealand in September’s T20 match, he made his international comeback. Later, came his award-winning spree. Yuvraj received the Arjuna Award, Padma Shri, and FICCI Most Inspiring Sportsperson of the Year Award. He played his last match for India in June 2017, against the West Indies. On June 10, 2019, he announced his retirement from all forms of international cricket. Along with that, he shared his post-retirement plans of helping cancer patients and spreading awareness about the disease.

Here’s why Yuvraj attaches great importance to April 2, 2011:

In 2012, the ex-cricketer established his own non-profit organisation ‘YouWeCan’ with the support of his mother, Shabnam Singh. It’s registered under the Bombay Trust Act, 1965, and aims to “empower all people to fight cancer, through awareness, early detection, patient support, and survivor empowerment”. Thus, they focus on spreading awareness, cancer screening, providing treatment support and scholarships for survivors. Till now, there have been 150, 000 cancer screening, 1, 25, 000 students sensitized in anti-tobacco workshops, 24, 000 men counselled for tobacco cessation, 30, 000 women sensitized on breast cancer, 150 cancer survivor students reintegrated into school through scholarships, and 30 children have been provided with cancer treatment since 2019. Yuvraj Singh states, “YouWeCan started as a simple idea from my hospital bed while I was undergoing treatment for cancer. It has grown into a national movement that has helped us impact over 350,000 people. We’ve got here, thanks only to your love and support! But this is just the start, we need to empower many more Indians with the right knowledge and tools to fight cancer!”

Check out an overview of #21daysofimpact by ‘YouWeCan’:

Now, partnering with One Digital Entertainment, he has started #Mission1000Beds, a new initiative to increase the capacity of hospitals for helping out the people suffering from COVID. As stated on YouWeCan’s Donate Kart website, “YouWeCan is now rapidly scaling up the critical care hospital capacity of 10-15% in hospitals across the country by setting up 1000 COVID-19 critical care beds under their initiative #Mission1000Beds. This hospital capacity increase program will include 1000 additional critical care beds, 2000 oxygen cylinders, 500 BiPAP machines, 100 Ventilators and other life-saving equipment. YouWeCan is setting up critical care beds across the country. Through this initiative, 6000+ patients will benefit every month all across the country.”

To get more details on ‘YouWeCan’ Foundation’s Hospital Critical Care Expansion, you can watch Yuvraj’s video here:

There are only 21 days left, and 525 donors have already reached out to help the organisation with its noble cause. Till now, Rs. 9, 12, 000 has been collected, and if you want to help out by donating then click here. Let’s support him and help people in these tough times!