SALT LAKE CITY - The burden of treating people with cancer is expected to grow in the mountain west over the next decade according to the Huntsman Cancer Institute.
On Thursday the Huntsman Cancer Institute announced a big multi-million dollar expansion that will open up beds for 50 additional patients needing cancer treatment.
Peter Huntsman, son of the recently deceased Jon M. Huntsman, spoke to Fox13 news and said the amount of people flooding into the treatment center has been overwhelming and that’s why they’ve decided to push forward on this expansion.
“Nation wide (we're) running at about 65 or 70 percent capacity and over the last couple of quarters, the better part of the past year, we’ve been running at 100 percent. We’ve actually been having to send people out and into the community and to other hospitals,” Huntsman said.
This $80 million project is expected to fix that issue and still continue the quality, nationally recognized cancer treatment.
“It will take just a great world-class Institute and make it that much larger,” Huntsman said. “We’re very excited about this.”
A Huntsman Cancer Institute representative said they expect to start building the expansion in December 2019 and open it in fall of 2022.
