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{
    "id": 928989,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/928989/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 261,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Siaya CWR, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. (Dr.) Christine Ombaka",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1007,
        "legal_name": "Christine Oduor Ombaka",
        "slug": "christine-oduor-ombaka"
    },
    "content": "My contribution to this topic is as follows. One, it is a topic that has taken too long to come to this House. Cancer is a disease that is long-term. It is said by specialists that it can be prevented once it is found on time. Most people cannot detect they have the disease until it has reached a certain level where it is untreatable. In that case, it becomes long-term, very traumatising and very expensive for the family, and the person who is affected normally has to abandon everything they have. They have to quit their jobs and go home to take care of themselves, as it is a very devastating disease. It is very expensive and the treatment in this country is very poor. If you look around at the hospitals that we have where one can get proper care, one sees that we do not have enough doctors who are specialised in treating this kind of disease. We have few of them. That is why most people seek treatment abroad. You can imagine those who do not have money to go abroad. Many of them die in the homes and in dilapidated hospitals. There is simply no care for the people who are affected by this disease. It is true that women suffer a lot from this disease. My mother died of cervical cancer. So, I am aware of how traumatising it can be. In my family, we were always crying. We did not know how to manage the disease at the family level. We caused so much stress to my mother who did not want us to shed any tear because she was in great pain. A lot of people cannot manage this disease. We are all traumatised as family members when a family member or a loved one is down with this disease. Therefore, the women suffer a lot. I know women have different types of cancer. We have breast cancer, cervical cancer, blood cancer, throat cancer and others. While women suffer from many types of cancer, we cannot forget men as well. They also have different types of cancer. They have throat cancer, blood cancer and many others. They are emerging from time to time. It may not be just a woman issue because it is also affecting men that we live with in our homes. As we talk about cancer, I would like us to think about men as well as children. If you go to hospitals, you will see a section within the hospital where children are kept to be taken care of. They suffer from cancer as well. It is a whole world of people who suffer from cancer. When we are dealing with cancer in this country, we are dealing with health matters that are not properly addressed in our system. I want to conclude ladies and gentlemen by saying that there is a lot that doctors have talked to us about. I have listened to what cancer is all about and how it can be prevented. We are constantly reminded that individuals must go for a full check-up every year to find out if there could be a symptom of cancer. That is so that it can be prevented on time because it is a disease that is very tricky in the sense that it is very silent; you do not get to feel it and it does not pain you when it starts. It starts paining when it has overblown, when it is too advanced so that treatment becomes difficult. That is why it is advisable that people should go for check-up early enough even when you feel well. I think that is the message that you need to know. We also need to train our young girls and boys and everybody else in this country that we need to go for check- ups. It should be a culture or a habit that we do every year. I know it is also expensive to go for The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposes only. Acertified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}