Ministry of Health receives funding boosts for cancer research |03 February 2018
The handover of the cheques
The Ministry of Health received a huge boost in donation from the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority and the Barclays Bank to fund its cancer research.
The research, which was set in motion in 2016, aims to investigate and analyse the trend in hereditary cancer to identify the segment of the population susceptible to the disease.
Dr Emelyn Shroff, director of research at the Public Health Authority, headed the team which collated the findings of the genetic maps of 45 breast cancer patients, 20 colorectal cancer patients as well as 7 patients suffering from other types of cancers.
She revealed some of the findings for a few of the colorectal cancer cases to the donors and health officials present during a seminar held yesterday to launch the week-long activities for World Cancer Day, which will be observed across the globe on February 4.
“We are able to find these at-risk individuals through the genetic mutations often associated to hereditary cancer,” Dr Shroff explained.
The analysis considered the patient’s family tree to detect incidences and tendencies for cancer in the first, second and third generation (up to grandparents).
Once the various tests have been conducted and the tendencies for cancer confirmed, family members of the cancer patient are also tested for the same mutations in order for the health authority to provide early intervention.
Jean-Paul Adam, the Minister for Health, who was also present at the seminar, described this as an innovative approach to proactively tackling the increase in cancer cases in the country.
“These types of research allows us to approach the disease from a different angle, and allows us to target the population most at risk,” the Minister stated whilst thanking the donors for their generous contribution to the research.
Barclays Bank donated the total sum of R300, 000 to the cause and the cheque was handed over to the Minister by the bank’s managing director Johan Van Schalkwyk.
“I think the initiation of this research project and the work that has been done so far builds awareness in terms of early prevention and gives a much higher survival rate which is extremely critical [..] At Barclays we believe that in a small way we need to contribute towards the health of the community because that affects us in multiple areas such as the economy,” Mr Van Schalkwyk said during his pronouncement.
In the same line, SCAA donated R100, 000 to the research team and the firm’s public relations officer, Jean Hassan, stated that SCAA is a company that is very concerned about the prevalence of cancer over the recent years.
“Some members of our staff have fallen victims to this disease with some even passing away from it. Cancer seems to have affected almost every family in the country so this is our way to help remediate the issue.” It is to be noted that SCAA made its first monetary contributions of R100, 000 to help with the research a year ago, in 2017.
Meanwhile the Ministry of Health plans to invest in training programmes for its medical professionals and staff to raise awareness on hereditary cancer and establish guidelines on how to detect this type of cancer.
Cancer is currently on the increase, becoming the second most common cause of death in the country with 130 cancer-related deaths recorded in 2017 alone.
178 new cases were detected between January 2017 and November 2017, of which 90 were male and 88 female.