Policy & public affairs All Party Group meets PM I
n order to discuss what more could be done to help women with secondary breast cancer, Breast Cancer Campaign
met with the Prime Minister and the Care Services Minister, Paul Burstow MP, at 10 Downing Street. Also in attendance were representatives from the All Party Group on Breast Cancer, Breakthrough Breast Cancer and Breast Cancer Care. The need to know how many women have secondary breast cancer was discussed, so that support and services can be planned for these women. The Prime Minister promised that the Government’s new cancer strategy would tackle this. When the strategy was published earlier this
year, Campaign welcomed the commitment to begin piloting data collection on secondary breast cancer in 2011-12 with full data collection beginning in April 2012 and the recognition that without accurate data collection, services cannot be effectively planned for people with secondary breast cancer.
Interview with Shadow Health Secretary
Following our recent interview with Paul Burstow, Minister of State for Care Services, on the Government’s policies (focus, October 2010- January 2011), we interviewed John Healey, Shadow Secretary of State for Health, about Labour’s views on key issues relating to breast cancer.
What action would Labour take to improve outcomes for people with breast cancer?
There has been a stark fall in breast cancer mortality over the last ten years, due in part to clinical advances and the unprecedented investment Labour put into the NHS. Labour set out a bold vision in 2007 to shift more emphasis onto prevention and early detection, for example through digital mammography. We had success there, but there is a great deal more that could be done. One of our most successful innovations was
the development of cancer networks, bringing together specialists across the care pathway to treat patients quickly, effectively and in comfort. Those networks need to be strengthened, not, as I fear will happen under the current Government’s plans, undermined through fragmentation.
Is breast cancer research a priority for the Labour party and what would you do to promote research in the NHS?
Of course breast cancer remains a priority for Labour, and will continue to be once we are in Government. Improving the systems that the NHS has to treat cancer patients, especially breast cancer patients, can only go so far. It’s through groundbreaking research, be it
targeted drugs or new diagnostic tests, that really makes an impact on improving survival rates, and I believe Government has an important role to play in promoting that research.
10 focus June-September 2011
How would you tackle health inequalities in breast cancer?
There are all kinds of health inequalities when it comes to cancer, be they inequalities in the incidence of different types of cancer, or different outcomes depending on the patients’ access to diagnosis and treatment. We know that early diagnosis
remains one of the key factors in improving survival rates for breast cancer (indeed any cancer) patients. Promoting awareness of breast cancer and a willingness to go and be tested is therefore a key variable in ensuring early diagnosis, and therefore reducing inequalities.
What has most surprised you since becoming Shadow Health Secretary?
It perhaps shouldn’t have surprised me, but the change from being a minister in Government to being in Opposition was huge. In Government I had two and a half thousand people working directly for me; now I only have two full-time members of staff, and I do my own diary. There is a vast health service, consisting of 1.4 million people and spending well over £100 billion a year, that I have to keep an eye on to provide an effective scrutiny and opposition to the Government. And that can be quite a challenge.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24