Buying a dialysis machine for a hospital from zakaah funds
Question

                Is it permissible to buy a dialysis machine for a hospital from zakaah funds? That is because the patients who need kidney dialysis in this city are forced to wait for a long time, hours or days, to get their turn, which has a negative effect on them, their health and their lives, because there are not enough resources for the patients in the city.
Praise be to Allah.
    Allah, 
    may He be exalted, has limited spending of zakaah funds to the eight 
    categories mentioned in the verse in which He says (interpretation of the 
    meaning):

    “As-Sadaqat (here it means Zakat) 
    are only for the Fuqara (poor), and Al-Masakin (the poor) and those employed 
    to collect (the funds); and for to attract the hearts of those who have been 
    inclined (towards Islam); and to free the captives; and for those in debt; 
    and for Allah’s Cause (i.e. for Mujahidoon - those fighting in the holy 
    wars), and for the wayfarer (a traveller who is cut off from everything)”

    
    [at-Tawbah 9:60]. 

    Based 
    on that, it is not permissible to use zakaah funds to purchase dialysis 
    equipment, because this is not one of the categories mentioned, and because 
    the benefit of such equipment is not only for the poor; rather all patients 
    will benefit from it, poor and rich alike. 

    But if 
    a poor person needs treatment in a local hospital in order to undergo 
    dialysis or other kinds of treatment, because it is not possible to do it in 
    a free hospital, then it is permissible to give him zakaah for this 
    purpose. 

    Shaykh 
    Ibn ‘Uthaymeen (may Allah have mercy on him) was asked: 

    What 
    is the ruling on giving zakaah to some charitable organisations for the 
    purchase of dialysis equipment? 

    He 
    replied: 

    That 
    is not valid; it must be given to the poor person to keep as his property on 
    the basis that he is poor, apart from the view of those who expand the 
    meaning of “for Allah’s cause” to include all kinds of charity, which is a 
    less strong view.

    End 
    quote from Thamaraat at-Tadween, no. 236, 7/2/1420 AH 

    
    However, the matter of spending to buy this equipment should not be 
    connected only to the obligatory zakaah for which there are very specific 
    categories of recipients; there are also funds from charitable donations 
    that Muslims are encouraged to give, and there are also charitable 
    endowments (awqaaf, sing. waqf) that the founders should devote to such 
    beneficial causes. 

    And 
    Allah knows best.