BUJUMBURA February 18th (ABP) – The assistant to the minister of Public Health and the fight against AIDS, Dr Onésphore Nzigirabarya, proceeded on Thursday, February 17th, 2022 to the opening of a workshop organized by the ministry of Public Health and of the Fight against AIDS in collaboration with its development partners, from February 17 to 18th 2022, to prepare the celebration of World Cancer Day in Burundi under the theme: “For fairer care”.
Dr. Nzigirabarya indicated that the objective of that workshop was to sensitize the public, political and health leaders on the issues of cancer and palliative care in Burundi.
He said that every year the world celebrates World Cancer Day on February 4th. It is an international day dedicated to raising awareness for the prevention and early cancer detection.
He said that each year, Africa registers about 1.1 million new cases of cancer and up to 700,000 deaths from the disease.
Breast cancer, along with cervical, prostate, liver and colorectal cancers, accounts for almost half of new cancer cases on the continent each year, he added.
Indeed, according to data provided by Globocan 2020, there were an estimated 7,929 new cases of cancer in Burundi, of which 19.9% represented cervical cancer, 10.1% breast cancer, 9.5% prostate cancer, 6% Kaposi’s sarcoma, 5.2% esophageal cancers and 49.2% for other cancers.
Dr Nzigirabarya did not forget to reveal the common challenges in the region. Those include lack of awareness and education, limited access to services for primary prevention and early detection of cancer as well as delays in diagnosis and treatment. He said access to palliative care and pain relief is also limited.
He underlined that the ministry in charge of Public Health, through the National Integrated Program for the fight against Chronic Non-Communicable Diseases, undertakes to set up a national cancer reference Center, draw up technical documents for the management of cancer, build the capacity of healthcare providers in the fight against cancer, educate the people about chronic non-communicable diseases, in particular cancer.
According to the assistant to the minister responsible for health, the ministry is also committed to raising awareness among political and health decision-makers on the challenges and solutions related to prevention, diagnosis and management as well as palliative care in cancer in Burundi, sensitize and prevent people on the risk factors of cancer.
He warmly thanked the WHO and other technical and financial partners as well as civil society organizations for the very beneficial efforts they provide for the health of the people of Burundi.
In his presentation, Dr. Jérôme Ndaryutse who represented the WHO in that workshop, indicated that cancer is becoming the first disease that attacks many people in Burundi. He pointed out that the WHO presents a wide range of interventions to prevent new cases of cancer.
Those include the fight against smoking, vaccination against hepatitis B to prevent liver cancer, the elimination of cervical cancer through vaccination against the human papillomavirus as well as screening and treatment.
Note that this day was celebrated in Burundi on February 18th, 2022.