On the eve of World Cancer Day, the International Union Against Cancer (UICC) and sanofi-aventis present their first interim report on the My child matters programme, launched in 2004 to advance the fight against childhood cancers in countries where paediatric oncology is still struggling to emerge.
The initiative so far has funded 26 projects in 16 resource-constrained countries: Bangladesh, Bolivia, Egypt, Honduras, Indonesia, Kenya, Mali,
Morocco, Peru, the Philippines, Romania, Senegal, Tanzania, Ukraine, Venezuela and Vietnam.
Although childhood cancers represent a small percentage of all cancers, the gap in the survival rate between industrialized and developing countries is marked and it is in these resource-constrained countries that 80 per cent of children with cancer live. Each year, more than 160,000 children are diagnosed with cancer and approximately 90,000 die. In industrialized countries, nearly 80 per cent of children being treated for cancer will survive. Unfortunately, this survival rate drops to 20 per cent and even 10 per cent in developing countries where access to information, early detection, effective care and treatment are often not available.
And yet today, most childhood cancers can be cured provided they are detected early and treated on time. Because every child is important, the My Child Matters programme encourages institutions (hospitals, NGOs, etc.) to develop pragmatic approaches to improve awareness, early diagnosis, access to care and treatment, pain control and better management of the social and cultural aspects of the disease for both children and their families.
So far, 900 members of the medical professions have participated in training sessions on childhood cancer and its management, 4,000 children have benefited from these programmes, and 2,100 families are being given support to help them gain a better understanding of their child's disease and how to live with it. In Tanzania for example, the project that was given support has already helped to reduce the time needed to analyse the results of a biopsy from six to two weeks. The number of childhood cancers diagnosed has improved from 145 to 364 at the end of 2006 (2007 objectives are to reduce the time to analysis to under a week and to diagnose 650 children).
In Honduras, the treatment dropout rate has fallen from 22 per cent at the start of the project to 10 per cent at the end of 2006 (the objective is to reduce it to 5% by the end of 2007). The number of families who have received psychological and social assistance has also increased, from only a few dozen to start with to 200 families in Egypt, 300 in Bangladesh, 360 in Venezuela and 450 in Vietnam by the end of 2006.
These preliminary and encouraging results show that it is possible to help project managers to reach progressively the objective of giving children from these countries the same chances of survival as those living in developed countries. Dr Franco Cavalli, the president of UICC, says, "We must improve the survival rate of children with cancer worldwide. In developing countries, where 80 per cent of children with cancer live and survival percentages are the lowest; government health budgets are insufficient to meet all needs.
The 'My Child Matters' programme, experts communicating through international networks forge valuable and lasting relationships. This initiative is helping to raise awareness that childhood cancers respond to treatment and can often be cured."
This commitment is shared by Jean-François Dehecq, chairman of sanofi-aventis, who adds: "One of the essential roles of a company like ours is to identify new avenues for research and to make innovative and effective treatment available to patients. Our corporate sponsoring action enables us to go a step further and construct, with UICC, a programme that encourages initiatives in countries where pædiatric oncology is less advanced, by giving them financial support and promoting an exchange of experience. Helping to even out the excessive differences between countries, in particular to help children also means more solidarity".
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