Health: Pancreatic Cancer

Baroness Jolly Excerpts

Monday 23rd April 2012 Grand Committee

[Baroness Jolly]

My Lords, I join with others in extending thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, for securing this debate, and to Cancer Research UK and Pancreatic Cancer UK for such excellent briefings.

One in three of us will get cancer in our lifetime, and that diagnosis, for the most part, is quite straightforward. The past decade has seen phenomenal increases in survival rates, such that fairly soon 2 million people will be living with and beyond cancer. That number is growing. This is real cause for celebration, but sadly not yet for those with pancreatic cancer. It has one of the highest incident-to-mortality ratios for any disease. The problems of difficult and late diagnosis, leading to late treatment—often too late for surgery—have been well outlined by noble Lords.

The coalition Government’s document, Improving Outcomes: A Strategy for Cancer, was published on 12 January this year. It set out a range of actions to improve cancer outcomes. Care Minister Paul Burstow said that the strategy,

“sets out our ambition to bring England's cancer survival rates in line with the European average by 2014-15”.

He added that this,

“shows that if England’s survival rates were as good as the best in Europe we would save 10,000 additional lives per year”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/11/11; col. 139W.]

He said that the Government estimated that of those additional lives saved, 75 would be those with pancreatic cancer. That is all to be welcomed, but 2014-15 is only three years away and we therefore need to understand what actions are being taken.

It is tragic that at the moment in England there is little hope for most patients with pancreatic cancer. The Government have acknowledged difficulties in late diagnosis, the need to consider biomarkers for pancreatic cancer because there are often no symptoms until late stages, the 2005 NICE guidelines for urgent referral of patients, the high incidence of late decisions around surgery—often too late—and some suggestion of reluctance on behalf of clinicians to recommend surgery.

In his summing up, I should be grateful if my noble friend the Minister could address three issues. What mechanisms and levers are there within the Health and Social Care Act that will be able to reassure carers and those who have pancreatic cancer that these aspirations can be met? What role does value-based pricing have in the long term? What engagement is there between the department and royal colleges to address the deficits in doctor training and continuing professional development in this area that is so particularly fraught?

Long-term research needs to be supported and accelerated and, on a brighter note, a few weeks ago, Kirtana Vallabhaneni, aged 17, from West Kirby, beat 360 other entrants to be awarded Young Scientist of the Year for 2012 for her work as part of the University of Liverpool’s research projects. She—at 17—was working on identifying the harmful cells that cause pancreatic cancer. We need many more like Kirtana to increase the level of care and survival rates that are so deserved by those with pancreatic cancer and their carers.