Thousands to protest in Dublin today at poor state of cancer care
The Cancer Care Alliance, made up of families and interest groups, says people are dying needlessly due to unacceptable radiotherapy and oncology services.
One of the organisers of the march, independent TD Jerry Coley, said the march would be a landmark in the campaign to improve cancer services.
“For the first time Irish families, interest groups and political parties will come together and march as one voice under the Cancer Care Alliance,” he said.
“We will march to state that the time has come for cancer care to be made a central priority of our Government.”
Much of the concern over cancer services in Ireland centres on the provision of radiotherapy. There are only two major centres providing this treatment in the country, in Dublin and Cork, and doctors say patients living well outside these areas are being denied life-saving treatment.
Dr Séamus Ó Cathail, a cancer specialist with Cork University Hospital, has claimed that up to 1,000 people are dying from cancer each year due to the lack of radiotherapy services.
Deputy Coley said that increasing the provision of this service would be one of the main aims of today’s march.
“Comprehensive and adequately funded cancer care must be delivered at national and local level. The most critical need facing cancer patients is the supply of additional radiotherapy facilities throughout the country,” he said. “The inequality of a three-month delay for such treatment is a national scandal. This cancer care apartheid must be ended.”
The Cancer Care Alliance also says there are serious problems with the provision of beds, daycare facilities and staff shortages.
The alliance has, however, welcomed Health Minister Micheál Martin’s announcement that the breast screening service, BreastCheck, will be extended nationwide within two years.
The scheme, which was supposed to be available nationwide last year, is still not up and running in the south or the west.
The decision to expand the service will require investment of €27 million and will mean 130,000 women, aged between 50 and 64, will be eligible for screening.
Two new clinical units will be established in Cork’s South Infirmary and the University College Hospital, Galway. Five new mobile units will cover areas of the country not within easy reach of the clinical units.
