Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Sport and Recreation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Each October we observe Breast Cancer Awareness Month and take stock of the work and progress of the past year. 2006 has been a year of progress. After much lobbying and research, the breast cancer drug Herceptin has finally been listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme for eligible patients. Until now Herceptin has been available only for late stage metastatic breast cancer, when the cancer had spread beyond the breast and axillary lymph nodes to a distant site such as bone, liver, brain or lungs. But trials had shown good results in the treatment of HER2 positive early breast cancer too. Then on 14 July the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee issued its recommendation to list Herceptin on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. On 22 August the Health Minister, Mr Tony Abbott, finally announced that the cancer drug Herceptin would be listed on the PBS ‘for the treatment of early stage breast cancer for women who are able to benefit from it’. Funding commenced on 1 October this year. This could cost Australia $100 million or more.

The recommended dose period is one year at a cost of about $60,000 per patient. We have all heard of desperate patients who could not afford this and of supportive families and communities who sacrificed themselves to try to provide this funding and a lifeline to so many sufferers of breast cancer. The funding of Herceptin represents a victory on the part of the dedicated people who work closely together in anticancer lobby groups, which work cooperatively with defined roles.

The National Breast Cancer Foundation directs research and raises funds. Ros Kelly, a former government minister and former breast cancer patient, is the present Chair of Trustees of the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Patron of the NBCF is Janette Howard, the Prime Minister’s wife and a former breast cancer patient. The NBCF has established the National Action Plan for Breast Cancer Research and Funding and has pledged $50 million to funding the best and most relevant research projects in Australia. Since its inception in 1995 it has committed $22.2 million to research and equipment grants, awards, fellowships and scholarships.

The National Breast Cancer Centre—the NBCC—deals with people and patients. It is responsible for promoting the early detection of breast cancer and has an important role in making sure that progress made through research is passed on to doctors. Former government minister and former breast cancer patient Jocelyn Newman is a member of the board of directors of the centre. One 2006 initiative has been the training of Indigenous health workers to care for women with breast cancer in their communities. Another has been the development of Australia’s first website for men with breast cancer.

The Breast Cancer Network Australia—the BCNA—is the peak national body representing Australians personally affected by breast cancer. Its trademark is the well-known Pink Lady logo. As leading breast cancer researcher and advocate Dr Linda Reaby has pointed out:

Cancer affects every Australian, either directly or indirectly.

Statistics from the National Breast Cancer Foundation show that the incidence of breast cancer is increasing and one in 11 women will get this disease by the age of 75; that breast cancer is the most common cancer among Australian women, with 11,800 women diagnosed each year; that in the past decade, however, mortality rates from breast cancer have fallen by 22 per cent; that more than 90 per cent of Australian women diagnosed with breast cancer will survive for at least two years and 84 per cent will survive for five years or longer; that the risk of breast cancer increases with age; and that over 70 per cent of breast cancers are found in women aged 50 and older. However, in younger women tumours may be more aggressive, resulting in a lower rate of survival.

Cancer is a national priority health area and breast cancer is one of the eight priority cancers identified. The government has committed to providing funding of $189.4 million over five years for the Strengthening Cancer Care initiative to 2008-09. Recent and current breast cancer research programs have focused on such areas as improving early detection, studying genetics and family and hereditary risk factors, and prevention factors. Overseas studies have reported a decreased risk of breast cancer among women who exercise regularly. Breast stem cells are a promising new research area that could generate important insights into how breast cancer develops. Another development which is exciting researchers is the training of cells to fight breast cancer.

The goal of the National Breast Cancer Foundation is ‘to raise enough money to fund the cure for this deadly disease’. Its National Action Plan for Breast Cancer Research and Funding has 12 priorities for immediate research action, which include an alliance of funding bodies, creating and sustaining long-term and large-scale projects, establishing databases of research and a national bank of tumours and relevant normal tissues for approved ethical research, and facilitating national and international research collaboration. Ros Kelly, Chair of Trustees of NBCF, says that $100 million is needed over the next decade to achieve this.

Certainly the past decade has seen an increasing and continuous effort by the breast cancer groups to raise both awareness and funds. Australians who have a high public profile—Kylie Minogue featured prominently last year—have generously allowed their own stories of breast cancer to be publicised. Last week in her address to the National Press Club, NBCF patron Sarah Murdoch praised the Australian media for its role in building awareness of breast cancer. She said that last year almost 12,000 families were affected by a diagnosis of breast cancer in both women and men. Sarah Murdoch supported the call to raise $100 million to implement the national plan and to build cooperation between research and fundraising areas. She pointed to the prominence now of corporate and product sponsorship, with ‘pink’ everywhere this month, from drink-bottle lids to apparel.

Breast cancer day—Pink Ribbon Day—will be celebrated on Monday, 23 October, and we expect a number of fundraising breakfasts, morning teas, lunches and dinners on that day. I know that on Sunday, 22 October in Canberra—which is of course the national capital and my electorate—Dragons Abreast will hold their annual Challenge Regatta, with an expected whopping 33 teams competing. I am proud to be a co-patron of Dragons Abreast. But that is not all that is happening on that day. The Mini Field of Women in Canberra will be set up for Sunday, 22 October. We have been promised that a special landmark in Canberra will be lit up in ‘glorious pink’. I am sure many of my colleagues will have noticed the way in which the public buildings in Canberra have been lit during the Floriade month.

I would like to conclude by thanking all those people who manage to find the time in their lives to help in this massive effort to reduce the incidence of breast cancer and the pain and suffering that accompany it. Lives have been saved and many more will be because of the efforts of those people.