Stakeholders in the fight against cancer have called for universal provision of care if the country is to fully implement the National Cancer Strategic Plan.

This has been observed during the Third Annual Malawi Cancer Symposium in Lilongwe organized by the UNC Project Malawi Cancer Program in collaboration with the country`s Ministry of Health.

Speaking during opening of the Symposium, UNC Project Malawi Cancer Programme Co-director Dr. Tamiwe Tomoka said despite the country having its first ever Cancer Center, more needs to be done to reach out to more people, especially those in rural settings.

“I would say that we are losing a lot quite a lot of people because of all these indications and I guess we are not moving as fast as we would because we are still losing people.

“What saddens me a lot is that we do have those people form the low social-economical places, they don’t have any voice to voice out for them when they need cancer care and referral, so this where we have to put our concerted efforts,” said Dr. Tomoka.

Concurring with Dr. Tomoka, Health Minister Khumbize Chiponda has admitted that despite such concerted efforts, Cancer remains a critical health challenge in the country.

“It is critical because we have a number of patients and some of the cancers are preventable and some of them are not preventable, and this is a serious challenge.

“And that is why we are pushing that we have our own cancer center here in Malawi so that we can attend more patients because when we send them outside it is expensive, and we cannot afford to take everyone there,” said Chiponda.

The two-day symposium is being held with funding from the National Institute of Health.