Nigeria needs political will to produce drugs for cancer patients

Can we meet you?

My name is Dr Mrs. Nneka Nwobi. I am the founder of the children living with cancer foundation

When did you establish your NGO?

About eighteen years ago.

Why do you think you have a solution to the problems of children living with Cancer?

Around that time there was no charity for childhood cancer in Nigeria. We had breast cancer very little for lungs and prostate cancer than any other cancer but actually known for childhood cancer and we had a lot of children who are in need of people to help them, and then there was no awareness about the childhood cancer. That was what informed the decision to establish the foundation.

What was your passion?

Seeing how Nigerian children, also their parents, uncles and grandparents, and siblings suffer, I saw that Nigerian children need the help that other children get abroad, and again the curing rate was very low because of the cure awareness about childhood cancer and that we are having these children brought very late. We don’t have an option that people who had cancer were brought earlier had a cure so the passion to have many Nigerian children of origin in Nigerian achieve a cure was utmost in our mind.

What exactly does Children Living Cancer Foundation Do?

Basically, it is to create awareness that is why we are here today so that parents can bring their children early to take away the illusion, that cancer really affects only adults. We try to achieve cures for as many children as possible we offer free chemotherapy drugs sometimes we update the payment and surgery which needed.

Is Cancer treatment for children free?

It is not free; it is very expensive. The treatment is between N3 million and N25 million. Radiotherapy alone is between N500, 000 and N1 million while Chemotherapy, and transplant are other modalities of treatment.

What resources are available for a child with cancer and their family

What we do is to give free chemotherapy drugs for the children, most times it is not just the drugs but there are so many things that can help to achieve cure in any ailment, so to speak we give the drugs we try to counsel the parents and the children. We try to give them a wholesome life; we celebrate their birthdays with them, children’s day, Christmas day, movie festivals etc. We try to give them a normal life as possible we can. We believe by so doing it will help prolong their life so that they know that they are not alone. We also bring in teachers to come and teach them in the ward on how to paints, how to draw, hand ow to make bags. A happy person rarely just gives up and dies the family needs to know that they are not alone that is part of the support that we have been doing. Every ailment needs a support system from the governments their community and friends we try to be in the gap for the children and the parents.

Can you tell us about your treatments so far?

We have children who have achieved cure so. Like I said, we started 19 years ago and in that 19 years people have been having success stories, as a matter of fact, one of the children was treated and survived. She is studying nursing now and is presently in her final year, we have another child who had two cancers and now he is into Engineering in Ogun State. We have so many of them, some are in secondary schools, some are already graduates, and so I will say that we have a success story. Many of them do die but then while they are alive, we try to give them support too even when we don’t have the money to help what we do is do fundraising for them and some of them have actually been helped to go Abroad for treatment especially India for treatment. Again, there is nothing they are doing in India we should not be able to do here in Nigeria, all we need is the political will to produce drugs, the drugs that we get are very expensive, India is already producing drugs for cancer, why can’t Nigeria do the same.

How do you get support to run your NGO?

Well, we do fundraising. We go to churches, companies media houses, and we are begging Nigerians to do what we call a standing order with their banks. Tell your banks that every month or every three months or six months or every year, we deduct an amount that you won’t even feel, like N500, N1000. By the time we have a lot of proof, we will be able to sustain whatever treatment any child need, it has not been easy. I will say that when we started raising funds, it was so hard because when you go out there to raise funds some people don’t even believe that children have cancer but now with the awareness that we have created people are more willing and then we see a surge of finance especially when we are on the radio and talk about what we do. We have parents of children who have cancer talk about their children themselves on Newspapers radio-television about their plight people just donate. We have people who are giving standing orders to their banks who help to support the charity our board members to try do one or two things occasionally we are not where we want to be I believe we will get there.

How do you get support and care for children living with Cancer?

As I said, we partner with tertiary institutions like the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), Igbobi, Ebonyi State, River State, Enugu State, Ogun State, Oyo State, Anambra State, and very few others in Nigeria. They come to us for links or we write through their doctors or they have seen us on the internet. We write application letters and get medical reports from their medical doctors and prescription is sent to us. Then we try to supply medications that they need, if we have to pay for surgery, we have to liaise with their primary health care to make sure that the money is paid for what it was meant for.

Can you provide information on the quality of life for the children?

The quality of life depends on their parent’s ability, we tell the parents to be with their children asking questions, and reading wide, and we give both nutritional talks and wellbeing talks to the children and the parents. We have experts in the field who come to talk to the children, we invite experts in lifestyles, we have parties with them every last Saturday of the month, and they also learn vocational curses so the parents are kept abreast of the cure of their children.

Can you tell us about your projects and programs?

When we started the charity, the cure rate was less than 20 per cent, now we are getting up to 2.5per cent. We are hoping to get to 30 to 40per cent in the next 5 years and we will go about educating the parents so that they can bring in their children early for screening. They can ask for their children to be investigated even when the diagnosis is given but when some parents discover that their children have cancer they reject it, they take their children for diagnosis shopping by the time they come back, and cancer would have spread.