FM Abdelatty visited the centre's construction site and signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for medical cooperation between the Egyptian Drug Authority and its Rwandan counterpart.

Rwanda's Minister of Health Sabin Nsanzimana attended the signing along with several officials.

Moreover, the two sides signed contracts to supply the heart centre with medical equipment.

The Egyptian Agency for Partnership and Development (EAPD), affiliated with the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, also funds the centre.

The centre is known in Rwanda as the Rwanda Heart Centre and is the third of its kind in Africa after the Cardiac Centre of Ethiopia and the Aswan Heart Centre in Egypt.

Abdelatty thanked all the parties involved in the project, most notably Sir Yacoub, whose efforts in establishing the centre in 2018 led to the signing of the MoU and the implementation of the project in June 2021.

Furthermore, Egypt's top diplomat expressed his keenness to complete the centre's establishment and turn it into a medical complex that provides the best healthcare on a global level.

The centre is a landmark project that aims to enhance healthcare cooperation between Cairo and Kigali.

It is expected to become a regional centre for heart disease treatment in East and Central Africa.

According to the centre's website, The Heart Care and Research Foundation (HCRFR), an NGO hospital providing free cardiovascular healthcare services to the people of Rwanda and its regions, will operate and fund the centre.

Here is a summary, by Ahram Online, of all you need to know about the project:

• The Magdi Yacoub Rwanda-Egypt Heart Centre is a humanitarian project that involves designing and constructing a 12,000-square-metre cardiac teaching hospital in the Rwandan capital Kigali.
• It will provide a full range of diagnostic and treatment services for congenital and acquired heart diseases, free of charge and equitably.
• Its mission is to transfer knowledge, skills, and experience across the region and help build a biomedical and innovation knowledge base by training a generation of young Rwandan doctors, nurses, scientists, and technicians to ensure sustainability in the region.
• It collaborates with the local government and will be owned, operated, and funded by the HCRFR, a Rwandan registered charity.
• The HCRFR is the realization of Professor Yacoub's vision to bring high-quality cardiothoracic healthcare to low-income populations across Africa.
• The HCRFR will equip a 30-bed state-of-the-art hospital and research facility in Masaka district in the Rwandan capital.
• The Egyptian Agency for Partnership and Development (EAPD), affiliated with the Egyptian foreign ministry, will donate two cardiac theatres, a catheter lab, nine fully equipped intensive care beds, six progressive care beds, and 15 ward beds for the hospital's equipment.
• The project aims to provide free treatment to everybody, regardless of wealth, religion, ethnicity, or gender, thereby affirming human dignity for all.
• It also aims to provide advanced medical services to children and adults with heart diseases in a purpose-built cardiac facility.
• The centre also promises to define the extent and nature of heart diseases in Rwanda through research to guide prevention programmes.
• The project will also be a training centre for young Rwandan doctors, nurses, scientists, engineers, and technicians at the highest international standards.
• The centre's building is designed to promote infection control and reduce airborne disease transmission through various innovative systems, including its overall layout, the flow of staff, patients, and visitors, and natural cross-ventilation.

In December 2021, former Egyptian foreign minister Sameh Shoukry and Dr. Yacoub participated in a celebration that marked the foundation of the centre in Kigali.

World-renowned Egyptian heart surgeon Magdy Yacoub, 88, is a professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at Imperial College London and the founder of the Magdi Yacoub Institute at Harefield Heart Science Centre.

He is also the founder of the Magdi Yacoub Heart Foundation, established in Egypt in 2008 to provide free medical services to the less fortunate and offer scientific, medical, and nursing education.