There is high increase of cancer, diabetes, heart disease, chronic lung, neurological and psychiatric diseases in Kenya even before malaria, HIV and tuberculosis have been brought under control.
According to Kenya’s Minister for Higher Education, Science and Technology Professor Margaret Kamar, this poses a double burden of diseases in the country.
“There is need to restructure the health delivery system and shift emphasis to promotion and preventive care in order to lower the nations disease burden,” Kamar said on Wednesday in Nairobi while opening a Non Communicable Diseases Alliance, Kenya research prioritization workshop.
She revealed that the prevalence of hypertension is 27 percent and that of diabetes is four percent, an increase that she attributes to increase in age, salt intake, low vegetable consumption, increased body weight and lack of physical activity.
“These two conditions are responsible for almost all cases of heart failure, heart attack, stroke and kidney failure in Kenya,” Kamar added.
According to the 2011 Global Medicine Report, the incident of cancer in Kenya are on the rise, with over 82,000 new cases reported annually and blames this upward trend to poor habit of Kenyans.
The report noted that the eating habit is to blame for the increase of breast, cervix, prostrate and oesophageal cancers.
“The poorest people have the highest risk of developing chronic disease and they are least able to cope with the resulting financial consequences,” the report said.
The minster noted that the communicable diseases are underestimated yet they cause poverty besides being a barrier to economic development and are impeding the achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
She said that non-communicable diseases account for about 22 percent of total mortality rates and over 50 percent of morbidity.
“It is important that the available research data be analyzed and presented in a format that could be easily understood by the policy makers,” she noted.
Kamar called for the formulation and effective implementation of policies and legislation that create and maintain an enabling environment to promotion of options and access to low salt in foods, affordable prices of fruits and vegetables, spaces and security for cycling and walking or jogging.
“Advertising and positioning unhealthy foods, alcohol and cigarettes to school should be controlled. Adherence to physical education lessons scheduled in schools should be increased and the tendency to substitute them with academic lessons stopped,” she said.
The Secretary of National Council of Science and Technology (NCST), Professor Shaukat Abdulrazak, told participants that the department has research funds and called on applicants on the area of non communicable diseases to apply.
He said that it was regrettable that South Africa handles 100 patents a year while Kenya only handles 42. “We gave 46 scholarships for masters and 76 PhD scholarships this year and intend to increase the funding next year,” he noted.
Dr. Ahmed Ogwell Africa World Health Organization (WHO) Team leader for Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) revealed that non communicable diseases account for 35 percent of deaths in the continent.
He called on experts non communicable players to seek alternative funding from different partners to help reduce the number of deaths of the diseases.
“The governments in the continent must put in place conducive infrastructure to help in early detection of non communicable diseases,” he said.
He advised non-communicable experts to put in place infrastructure for all non communicable diseases instead of coming up with separate facilities for individual diseases adding that acquiring findings may prove a tall order for governments in developing countries.
Kenya’s Director of non communicable diseases Dr. William Maina challenged participants that were drawn from Nigeria, Togo, Zambia, South Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Ghana to consider involving all stakeholders from all walks of life in the management of the diseases.
He revealed that the policy on cancer is due to be released anytime adding that the national cancer control bill is already in parliament awaiting deliberations and maybe passed soon.
“Non communicable disease should be in the development agenda beyond the year 2015 so that proper attention can be given to the diseases,” the Coordinator of Consortium on Non Communicable Diseases (CNCD) Dr. Mary Nyamongo said.
Nyamongo appealed to participants to involve policy makers so as to address all causes of ill health and poverty that are a major contributor to non communicable diseases.
She calls for the interventions that promote healthy diets and physical activities as a way of managing the rise of the diseases.
According to the Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) 2011 cancer unit report, Kenya has five clinical oncologists, four medical oncologists and about eight oncologists.
Kenya is ranked 148 out of 187 countries surveyed in the 2011 human development index and is categorized as low income country in the annual rankings of national achievement in health, education and income by the UN Development Program (UNDP).
source: coastweek
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