…Calls on government to subsidise treatment
By Matthew Denis, Abuja
An Oncologist, Dr. Ademola Adeyeye has called on patients not to panic when diagnosed with cancer infection stressing that the disease is treatable.
He made the disclosure during a interview with on Wednesday as the World marks Cancer Day today.
The Oncologist said, “Patients shouldn’t be panicked anytime they are diagnosed of cancer, the disease is treatable, curable and can be managed depending on the stage of the patient.
“The main challenge we have in this part of the world is that patients are not able to afford cancer treatment. Nigeria is ranked one of the countries with the most extremely poor people with about 85 million of the population unable to afford basic medical treatment.”
Adeyeye tasked the government at all levels to subsidise the treatment for patients with cancer diseases in the country to reduce the large number of infection.
“The level of cancer awareness in Nigeria is low therefore the government needs to channel more facilities for cancer treatment and provide incentives for cancer patients.
“We have patients with cancer but nobody has really gone deep in cancer surgery. With this, we are trying to bring in European standard of treatment into our cancer care in Africa but the challenge now is that people get to see different kinds of doctors for cancer treatment when we know that there are specialists for each kind of condition.
“We want to use this opportunity to encourage more physicians to go into this kind of training so that we can have more people in the field.”
The Kwara-born medical consultant is the first black African to bag European Board Certified Surgical Oncologist (Cancer Surgeon) in 2018.
Adeyeye is a Consultant General Surgeon and Surgical Oncologist (cancer surgeon) with the Department of Surgery UITH Ilorin and Co-founder of Lifefount Hospital, Tanke Ilorin hails from Omu-Aran, Irepodun Local Government Area of Kwara State.