The announcement last week by the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, that Breastcheck - the national breast cancer screening programme - is to be extended to all areas is most welcome
It represents a commitment to end the geographic inequalities that have blighted an otherwise successful initiative aimed at saving women's lives. To date, screening has been offered to over 100,000 women in the east and midlands. Up to 500 breast cancers have been detected. Women in Munster, Connacht and Ulster can now look forward to equal access to Breastcheck in two years.
Or can they? While no one can question Mr Martin's personal commitment to a national breast cancer screening programme, his statement referred only to the required investment of 27 million. It did not say that the Department of Finance had confirmed that this funding would be available. Based on recent statements on the health service, a national roll-out of Breastcheck will only be guaranteed when the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, gives a public commitment to fund it.
Such scepticism is reinforced by the attitude of campaigners who marched to the Dáil at the weekend seeking improved cancer treatment services. Supporters of the Cancer Care Alliance - who specifically targeted Mr McCreevy during the protest - clearly believe it is the Department of Finance that effectively controls health policy. The broadly based alliance has correctly identified cancer care as a key deficiency among the many in our public health service. Its reference to a "cancer care apartheid" is reinforced by statistical evidence. For example, 24 per cent of patients with breast cancer along the western seaboard received radiotherapy for their disease compared with 42 per cent of women in the east. There are ten public radiotherapy machines in Cork and Dublin. Each machine can treat 350 patients every year. Based on a maximum national treatment capacity of 3,500 patients, and applying internationally accepted guidelines, less than one third of the 12,000 patients who require radiotherapy in the Republic each year receive it. Public patients face a three-month delay for radiation treatment that they have been told is both necessary and urgent. When added to an acknowledged deficit in bed numbers and a shortage of trained oncology nurses, it is no wonder the Republic lags significantly behind EU average figures for death from cancer.
Despite the fiscal challenges it faces, it is time the Government gave a commitment to multi-annual funding for cancer care in order to end a treatment lottery that is costing people's lives.