Lack of drugs, facilities makes cancer a big challenge: Doctor

UNAVAILABILITY or high cost of drugs and difficulties in obtaining treatment modalities that hospitals and clinics should have make cancer an even bigger challenge in PNG, a doctor says.
Dr Kenneth Sodeng made the comment during a presentation of breast cancer drugs by Abt Health and HIV/AIDS implementation service provider to the Port Moresby General Hospital cancer clinic yesterday.
Sodeng said cancer drugs were not medicines that one could buy over the counter.
“Cancer drugs are for specific diseases and we are thankful for the kind donation of cancer drugs by the Abt for breast cancer because it will go a long way in terms of helping our patients,” he said.
Sodeng said most of the patients diagnosed with breast cancer were young women and he encouraged women to have regular checks.
“We think that breast cancer is a disease of people with family history but it’s a lifestyle disease as well, the type of food you eat, how much physical activity you do and how much rest you get.
“When you do not look after your lifestyle, you end up easily getting breast cancer,” he said.
Abt representative Naomi Kuapoitaim said the initiative for their donation was that one of their colleagues was a cancer patient and another a cancer survivor.