Roche pledges funding for Ethiopian cancer care

Roche is to contribute a donation of funding to a new programme that will aim to raise standards of basic cancer care in Ethiopia.

A grant has been allocated to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in New York for use in the new project, which is being developed by Dr Carol Harris.

It will aim to enhance care quality by improving patient navigation through the system, implementing standardised protocols and reporting, and developing a pilot site for regional care centres, as well as bolstering public awareness of the disease.

The programme will focus primarily on women's reproductive cancers, as this presents the most significant cancer burden in Ethiopia and affects many patients under the age of 40.

It is hoped that this can help to address the lack of infrastructure in the African nation, which has only one cancer hospital despite possessing a population of more than 80 million.

Earlier this month, Roche won praise from the York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust for the benefits its Cobas Academy e-learning tool has delivered for the facility.