Board demands biobank to tackle cancer surge

WITH cancer cases predicted to double by 2020 from 2000 levels, an expert group on behalf of the Health Research Board has demanded a national cancer biobank be set up as soon as possible to tackle the upsurge.

A cancer biobank is a carefully managed collection of tissue samples and related clinical information drawn from voluntary anonymous donors.

These samples act as a test bed to help researchers to better understand the mechanism of the disease, develop new drugs, assess the validity of diagnostic markers, and devise tailor-made therapies for the treatment of cancer.