The Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr Iziaq Kunle Salako, says the burden of cancer is increasing in Nigeria.
Salako said it demands deployment of all solutions and management possibilities by the Federal Government to tackle the scourge.
He spoke in Abeokuta, Ogun State, on Friday, while launching Oncoseek, a blood based test that can be used for early detection of nine high mortality cancers.
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The launch was part of a two-day workshop on the Development of National Nuclear Medicine Guidelines/Policy by the National Technical Working Group.
In his remarks, the Minister said the Federal Government had in February inaugurated the technical working group comprising key and diverse professionals in the space to work out how Nigeria can begin to deploy nuclear medicine services and technologies to improve the health of Nigerians.
Salako said the government has also begun
implementing programs cutting across prevention, treatment and control, including the ongoing construction of six cancer centres of excellence across the six geopolitical zones.
According to him, under the second phase in the agenda to provide state of the art cancer treatment infrastructure is set to commence under the 2025 budget.
He announced that the Federal Medical Centre (FMC) Abeokuta has been selected to be a recipient of a cancer center of excellence under the 2025 budget.
The Minister assured the TWG of the full support of the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare to ensure that what policy or guidelines they come up with will be used to action practical initiatives in nuclear medicine that can benefit the people.
“As we know, a key challenge of cancer care in our country is late detection and presentation. A lot of cancers often present with signs and symptoms that mimicks other diseases and may miss being detected.
“Screening services that can detect cancers early or even at the precancerous stage is therefore an important mechanism in the prevention and control of cancer.
“Oncoseek, a blood based test that can be used for early detection of 9 high mortality cancers including nine high-mortality cancer types, including breast, colorectal, esophageal, liver, lung, lymphoma, ovarian, pancreatic, and stomach cancer being introduced today is a welcome development,” he said.
He said Oncoseek will be useful for screening and to identify patients that may require definitive diagnostic tests.
The Minister urged practitioners to prioritize the provision of cancer screening services using tools like Oncoseek.
The President of Nigerian Cancer Society, Abidemi Omonisi, expressed worry over what he called overlapping of functions in the cancer space, saying both patients and the country have suffered from the challenges.
He called streamlining of operations for efficiency and in order to minimise wastage.
Chairman of the National Technical Working Group, Dr Kehinde Ololade, explained that the aim of setting up the TWG is to ensure that general principles, guidelines and policies of nuclear medicine treatment and management are established.
He said the TWG broke out into different sub-committees including infrastructure, clinical practices, policy and guidelines, governance and advocacy, finance and resource mobilization as well as human capacity development.
Ololade said the various sub-committees have gone into archives with a view to achieving their assignments to help come up with a final guidelines and policy on nuclear medicine.
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