CANCER experts have blamed the poor state of cancer care and survival rate in the country on delayed treatments, delayed referrals, government lackadaisical attitude towards cancer care and wrong lifestyles.
Bone cancer experts, who spoke in Lagos during a three –day scientific conference on the challenges in the management of musculo-skeletal tumours (bone cancer) organised by the National Orthopaedic Hospital, Igbobi, said government disinterest in training cancer experts and providing cancer equipment, coupled with patients' delay healthcare seeking behaviour, were worsening cancer statistics in the country.
Guest speaker and Professor of Surgery at the Bowen University Teaching Hospital, Prof. Samuel Eyesan, a bone and tissue oncologist (cancer expert), said although cancer currently kills more than human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), malaria and tuberculosis combined, the Nigerian government was not interested in caring for those living with the condition by way of subsidising treatment and experts training.
He explained that Nigeria records 100 thousand new cancer cases every year, adding that Nigeria currently has only three bone and tissue cancer specialists and three radiotherapy centres, a situation, he said, has not helped in saving the lives of those with the condition.
Eyesan, who said he had seen at least three Nigerians non-smokers, including a professor of thoracic medicine, who died of lung cancer recently, blamed wrong lifestyle bothering on fruits deficient diet, obesity and inadequate exercise as some of the factors driving cancers epidemics in Nigeria.
He regretted that Nigeria does not have reliable statistics on cancer, even as he called on government to enforce the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended cancer control policy.
Chairman of the occasion and professor of orthopaedics at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH) Prof.Sulaiman Olajiwola-Giwa, stated that cancer patients' cultural and religious beliefs were hampering cancer care and treatment, as patients prefer seeking medical help in religious houses and trado-medical places to hospitals.
He called on patients to always seek medical help early in hospitals, as delay was not only dangerous, but could lead to amputation of limbs and loss of lives.
Chairman of Local Organising Committe,Dr. Muna Chira, said apart from paucity of cancer experts in the country, cancer units in hospitals were underfunded.
