The wife of Anambra state governor, Mrs Nonye Soludo, has emphasized the need for greater cancer grassroots awareness and continuous education.
Mrs Soludo who stated this in Awka in a statement released to mark the 2023 World Cancer Day, said that it is important to build a more strategic collaboration among all stakeholders leading the war against the deadly disease, to give the campaign a more effective uniformity.
World Cancer Day is celebrated globally on the fourth of February each year, with data released by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2021 putting the number of new cases in Africa each year at approximately 1.1 million, with about 700,000 deaths.
The data also estimates an increase in cancer mortality to nearly one million deaths per year by 2030, if urgent and bold interventions are not taken.
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Speaking on the theme of this year’s event, “Close the care Gap: Uniting our voices and taking action,” Mrs Soludo said that with the figures of cancer cases and deaths speeding up, more pragmatic actions must be taken, including maintaining steady reach-out to the people through different channels of communication, on the importance of timely screenings to surviving the disease.
She also stated that the theme for the year beckons on people with genuine interests to build stronger synergy and create smarter innovations that would give the fight against all types of cancer a more productive outlook.
Mrs Soludo further explained that with the ongoing free cervical cancer screening and treatment initiated by the Anambra state government for women and girls residing in the state, the current administration has shown that it is committed to enacting the right policies that would not only clamp down on the disease but also save the lives of those living in the state.
While repeating her earlier calls for women and girls to get actively involved in the ongoing exercise, Mrs Soludo reiterated that timely screening helps one to know their status, thereby making cancer treatment easier and more effective.
Emmanuel Ukoh
