There is no good news about cervical cancer in Mexico. The number of cases continues to increase and women continue to seek medical attention in advanced stages.

As with other conditions, treatment for this cancer has stalled during the covid-19 pandemic. For civic organizations such as the Mexican Association Against Cancer (AMLCC), the current administration has lost the opportunity to reduce cervical cancer cases as medical consultations and lab tests have been suspended during this health emergency.

Everything that was achieved through preventive information campaigns fell apart in this six-year period, various non-governmental organizations working with cancer patients agree. Partly because of the covid-19 pandemic, but also because of the lack of a national plan for the timely prevention and detection of this type of cancer in women. And not to mention the NOM for the Prevention, Treatment and Control of Cervical Cancer, which, like other official standards, wants to be abolished by the Federal Department of Health without any explanation, which for civil groups will affect the attention of women. .

Cervical cancer is the second leading cause of death among Mexican women aged 20 to 59 after breast cancer, according to Inegi. It is estimated that there are more than 9,500 new cases and more than 4,300 deaths each year. The numbers continue to grow. Although there are human papillomavirus vaccines that can prevent cervical cancer, and which the WHO itself has recommended for girls aged 9 to 14 when they have not yet begun sexual activity, they have also been suspended during the pandemic and, although the government is keen to reactivate it, there is a significant lag.

With 2023 being World Cervical Cancer Day, there isn’t much to celebrate as Mexican women continue to die from the disease, which is curable if caught early. However, within this adverse health picture, there are projects such as the one the AMLCC will sign with ISSSTE hospitals that will seek to reduce cancer in women through early detection. This project is attracting attention because it is initiated by civil society and the federal government. The civil group, through a donor, purchased various specialized medical equipment, which they distributed in ISSSTE hospitals, designed to care for all low-income women, whether or not they are beneficiaries.

For the developers of this agreement, the complex health problem in our country makes such a complex response inevitable. We hope that this medical project will be the beginning of a response for millions of women who do not have access to medical care and who, having neither money nor time, put off going to the doctor and, unfortunately, come when the cancer has already set in. we won’t heal.

tongue depressant

Abelardo Menezes Garciawho led the National Cancer Institute after two periods of five years and was one of the proponents of improved care for cancer patients, completes his phase on August 15 this year at the head of one of the National Cancer Institutes. The biggest health in the country.

During his tenure, the issue of palliative care has been strengthened, the number of oncologists has increased, and their experience has become key during the covid-19 pandemic in caring for patients with this disease. He leaves, but it is not yet known who will become his successor. Doctors on the list Oscar Arrieta Rodriguez; Alfonso Duenas Gonzalez And Erica Becabe Ruiz Garcia.

UNDER THE MICROSCOPE

For the two most important public universities in the country, UNAM and UAM, to issue separate messages to encourage their student and teaching communities to use face masks again to protect themselves from covid-19 when they are indoors or with large numbers of people , which are worth paying attention to, you just need to remember that they have “other data”, perhaps more accurate than the official ones.

It was not for nothing that during the pandemic, the federal government, through the Ministry of Health, pushed them aside when it warned of an increase in the number of cases and the urgency of conducting rapid tests to detect the virus. We’d better heed their warnings!