Too few for too many cancer patients

To have more than a hundred thousand people added every year to the list of patients afflicted by a disease is a burden for any healthcare system. It gets even worse when the disease happens to be cancer. Given the extremely limited facilities available in Bangladesh, cancer patients in the country, particularly people belonging to the low- and middle-income groups, are facing grim prospects with the likelihood of treatment and cure getting so much more remote.

While government efforts to add value to the general healthcare system, and make it more accessible to the people, are noteworthy—with the private sector making sizeable contribution—specialised treatment facilities have not developed in equal measure in the country to keep pace with the growing number of cancer patients. Radio therapy machines are scanty in the lone government hospitals treating cancer while it costs a pretty penny in private hospitals, even for those who fall into the well-to-do category. And even then, one has to wait between two to six months for one's turn for getting the treatment. Considering the fact that cancer cells mutate very rapidly, such an inordinately long wait is almost always fatal.

It is time the health ministry took into cognisance the gravity of the matter. Incidence of cancer is on the rise. Investment must be made immediately to make both diagnostic and treatment facilities easily available to the patients, and at a cheaper cost. And in keeping with the increase in infrastructure facilities, an adequate number of cancer specialists, currently at a dismally low level, must also be trained.