First Lady headlines global cancer meeting
. . . chronicles Zim’s fight against childhood cancer
ZIMBABWE health ambassador — First Lady Dr Auxillia Mnangagwa — was invited to be among the panellists at a high-level meeting commemorating the fifth anniversary of the launch of the Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer.
The event, which was held on the sidelines of the 78th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, ran under the theme “Cure all implementation advancing toward Universal Health Coverage realisation and bridging the survival gap in childhood cancer”.
Dr Mnangagwa joined other high-profile panellists — including President of the Slovak Republic, Her Excellency Zuzana Caputová, director-general of the World Health Organisation Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, global health experts and health advocacy champions — at a round-table discussion centred on enhancing survival for children with cancer.
The high-level event was hosted by the Slovak Republic, St Jude Children’s Research Hospital (WHO Collaborating Centre), World Health Organisation, and the International Society of Paediatric Oncology (SIOP).
The meeting sought to strengthen children, adolescents and young adults’ health, considering its complexity and diversity, by effectively addressing current challenges and activating a global network and effort to bridge the gaps.
It also discussed the role of non-State actors, including engagement strategies to amplify the voice of the affected population, in line with WHO’s campaign and framework, and by partnering with states in strengthening social and health systems to deliver essential services for all children, including their families, and covering the most vulnerable.
Goals included the need to activate stakeholders around the shared target of improving survival for children with cancer.
In her remarks on advocacy, Dr Mnangagwa acknowledged that the global burden of cancer was increasing worldwide and about half a million children under 19 years were estimated to develop cancer each year.
“According to our own National Cancer Registry, in 2018, a total of 293 paediatric cancers were registered, accounting for 3,7 percent of all cancers diagnosed in Zimbabwe. The five most common cancers diagnosed were leukaemia, Wilms tumours, retinoblastoma, lymphoma and rhabdomyosarcoma. If cancers are diagnosed early and appropriate treatment is given, 80 percent of childhood cancers can be cured. However, like most lowto middle-income countries, cure rates are much lower,” she said.
Many factors, Dr Mnangagwa said, contribute to these lower cure rates, including late presentation, poor diagnostic tools, shortages of chemotherapy drugs, poor quality medicines, poor access to radiotherapy services, cultural and spiritual beliefs and high cost of the treatments.
According to the World Health Organisation, she said, there were four pillars to cancer control — prevention, early detection, diagnosis and palliative care.
“In children, these pillars are ensured and consented by the caregivers who are usually the mothers in most developing countries. It is my view that cancer control for childhood cancers can only be effective if awareness of cancers in general in these caregivers is high. A mother who is aware of the risks, signs and symptoms and benefit of early diagnoses and treatments of breast cancer and cervical cancers, the commonest cancers amongst women, will also be more likely to be interested in childhood cancers, thus, knowing the signs and symptoms of cancer in her child. She will also more likely look for medical treatment timeously, consent for testing and treatment and adhere to follow programmes for her child.
“This is why through my Angel of Hope Foundation — where I am the patron — we have been driving cancer awareness programmes amongst women in Zimbabwe. The programme has reached more than 70 000 women to date and more will be reached as we move on with the programme.
“Our hope is that these women will be able to help fight the myths about cancer, increase early diagnosis of childhood cancers and reduce the late presentation and treatment dropouts amongst the children who may be diagnosed with cancers in their own family and communities. Parental care is needed to monitor and supervise the children,” she said.
In addition, the First Lady said her foundation, working with the Ministry of Health and Child Care, has carried out the human papilloma virus (HPV) vaccination for young girls aged between 10 and 14 in an effort to curb cancer.
The Government of Zimbabwe — through both the Ministry of Health and Child Care; and the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education — she added, have for years been trying to increase the human resource needed for cancer control. There are a number of training programmes available that include oncology nursing, paediatric oncology, hemato-oncology medical physics, therapy radiography and radiation oncology.
“We are, however, very grateful that they still have well-meaning partners like St Jude Hospital, who still have a heart to develop childhood cancer control programmes in developing countries, to complement our efforts, for that we are so much grateful.
“The department of paediatrics at one of our universities is working closely with St Jude Hospital and a non-governmental organisation — Kidzcan — in improving the outcomes of cancer treatments for children. Efforts are also being made to decentralise those services for greater access to care for all communities in Zimbabwe. Respected guests, ladies and gentlemen, we are now in 2023, in the second half of the Agenda 2030, which was set in 2015 at the UN General Assembly with the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved.
“I am happy that today, we are here to evaluate one of these and a section of SDG Number 3, SDG 3.8 — whose target aims to achieve universal health coverage, including financial risk protection, access to quality essential health care services, and access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential medicines and vaccines for all pertaining to childhood cancer care.
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