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Speaker 1: Now the Cancer Control Agency has dropped as twenty twenty

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Speaker 1: five report and they have conclusions, and their conclusions is

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Speaker 1: we need more funding and we need earlier detection that

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Speaker 1: we can cancer cases will climb from just over thirty

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Speaker 1: thousand this year to more than forty five thousand by

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Speaker 1: twenty forty four. And half of those cases they say

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Speaker 1: could be prevented if we cut tobacco, dial back the booze,

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Speaker 1: and got serious about healthy living and sun safety. So

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Speaker 1: joining me now to talk about this is Nicola Kerman.

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Speaker 1: Nicola is the chief executive for the Southern Cancer Society.

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Speaker 1: Hello Nicoler, excuse me, Hello.

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Speaker 2: Nikola, Good morning Andrew.

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Speaker 1: So how do these numbers compare to other countries. Do

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Speaker 1: we have more cancer in New Zealand than other places

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Speaker 1: or is this within the international standard?

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Speaker 2: Great question look in to New Zealand is unfortunately leading

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Speaker 2: the way in areas that we wouldn't want to be

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Speaker 2: leader in. So in terms of melanoma, we leave the

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Speaker 2: world in rate of diagnosis around melanoma. But there's a

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Speaker 2: lot of good news in this report. There's good news,

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Speaker 2: but we can do better. I think some of the

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Speaker 2: things they're really encouraging about this report is that our

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Speaker 2: survival rates are increasing, So that means the likelihood of

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Speaker 2: someone in New Zealand doing of cancer is declining and

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Speaker 2: the chances of them surviving greater than five years posted

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Speaker 2: diagnosis has also improved. But generally people in New Zealand

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Speaker 2: are living longer with cancer. Yes, they are in other

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Speaker 2: OECD countries as well. But I would say that other

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Speaker 2: OECD countries that we compare ourselves to are doing far

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Speaker 2: more in the cancer prevention space than we are, and

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Speaker 2: therefore they are preventing more cancer than we are in

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Speaker 2: New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: And is that because of more funding because you said

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Speaker 1: that in your conclusion earlier detection more funding. Are we underfunded?

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Speaker 2: Yes, I'd say we are in key areas, and those

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Speaker 2: key areas would be around access to medicines. Look, we

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Speaker 2: had a significant increase in cancer medicines. The pharmac budget

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Speaker 2: was increased by six hundred and four million. We had

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Speaker 2: an uplift and that's resulted in more lives being saved.

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Speaker 2: But we can't stop there and do these one off

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Speaker 2: you know. I think we've got to get into ourselves

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Speaker 2: into a position in New Zealand where we're continually investing

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Speaker 2: in cancer and in health as opposed to reactively investing.

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Speaker 2: One of the things that this report does show is

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Speaker 2: there the things we're doing in the country that is

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Speaker 2: that are working well. So let's keep doing it. Let's

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Speaker 2: not do it as a one off or fund it

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Speaker 2: as a one off. Screening is an example of that

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Speaker 2: and prevention.

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Speaker 1: And that is within our own orbits and we can

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Speaker 1: do that. That's up to us taking personal responsibility. But

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Speaker 1: I needed to get down to the point of what

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Speaker 1: kind of level of extra funding might we need to

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Speaker 1: help you achieve these goals.

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Speaker 2: Well, look, I think there's three key areas that this

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Speaker 2: government could fund or the next government, and they are

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Speaker 2: the introduction of lung cancer screening. This report shows that

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Speaker 2: one of the biggest areas that we could have an

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Speaker 2: impact on is lung cancer. Your half of all cancer

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Speaker 2: deaths are from.

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Speaker 1: Five Again, what sort of level of funding will be needed?

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Speaker 2: What sort of money, So there's actually a business case

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Speaker 2: going to Treasury probably are right about now or in

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Speaker 2: the next couple of weeks to funds a lung cancer

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Speaker 2: screening program. So to establish that, we're probably talking anywhere

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Speaker 2: between sixteen to twenty million for a lung cancer to

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Speaker 2: introduce a lung cancer screening program in New Zealand. I

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Speaker 2: think the country country knows beal cancer screening. You know,

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Speaker 2: we could save significant numbers of lives if we started

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Speaker 2: screening people for bel cancer at age fifty. And I

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Speaker 2: know the government know that. I know they're making good steps.

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Speaker 2: That's been reduced from sixty to fifty eight already, but

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Speaker 2: we've got to have a plan to keep producing that

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Speaker 2: getting that down to fifty.

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Speaker 1: All right, Nikola, thank you so very very much. That

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Speaker 1: is Nicola kumb from the Southern Kansas Society.

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Speaker 2: For more from earlier edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live

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Speaker 2: to News Talks at B from five am weekdays, or

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