Govt. to open cancer units at every district hospital

Setting up of a Cancer Unit at each and every District Hospital with a Cancer Specialist, launching a project to establish a centre for bone marrow transplant and providing modern Chemotherapy machines to all existing cancer wards were among measures discussed at the Presidential Secretariat yesterday for the benefit of cancer patients when President Maithripala Sirisena met a team of cancer experts.

Members of the Sri Lanka Cancer Specialists Association presented a set of proposals to President Sirisena at this meeting in order to mitigate the sufferings of cancer patients, provide modern treatment and control of cancer as cancer is one of the biggest killers among noncommunicable diseases.

President Sirisena said a national programme was necessary to deal with control, treatment, drugs supply and caregiving on cancer patients as the steady increase of cancer patients has become a national health problem.

He pointed out that when serving as the Health Minister he initiated a number of programmes on behalf of cancer patients but the previous government did not give the encouragement or financial assistance to continue the programme.

Cancer specialists also presented a set of proposals to be implemented for the welfare of cancer patients to President Sirisena.

He pointed out that the previous government did not give the encouragement or financial assistance to continue the programme

Though cancer treatment is being carried out at the National Cancer Institute at Maharagama (NCIM) and cancer units have been set up at Kandy, Karapitiya, Badulla, Anuradhapura, Jaffna, Batticaloa, Kurunegala and Ratnapura hospitals, it was extremely vital to open cancer units at all district hospitals, the Cancer Specialists stressed.

Over 25,000 cancer patients are treated as inward patients at NCIM and hospitals but the facilities at those institutions is not sufficient to treat all cancer patients in the country, they added.