People in Ontario living with cancer, their loved ones and care providers send a message at Queen’s Park to call for improvements to the province’s cancer care system
Toronto, November 18, 2024 – Today, people living with cancer, their families, care givers and loved ones gathered outside the legislative building in Toronto, to call for urgent action on addressing the lengthy wait times they are experiencing at every step of their cancer journey, and the financial burden that comes with a cancer diagnosis.
Ontario’s time interval (i.e., how long patients had to wait) from diagnosis to treatment of cancer was rated as room for improvement across all disease sites. Furthermore, access to primary care remains an ongoing challenge with 2.5 million people in Ontario without a family doctor and as a result, 26.1% of patients with cancer in Ontario receiving their diagnosis in an emergency room.
“My daughter, Desiree, was diagnosed after nearly two years of delays. Endometrial cancer is likely curable at stages 1 and 2, however a fractured medical system resulted in her late-stage diagnosis,” said Rosan Butt, a resident of Ontario, who has been fighting to tell her daughter, Desiree’s story, after she passed away at 35 due to late-stage cancer. “Our family was faced with a devastating choice between financial ruin or saving my daughter’s life because of the high out of pocket costs for treatments she needed. The system failed my daughter and us, and she paid the ultimate price.”
Desiree’s story is unfortunately one of many. The reality is that people in Ontario living with cancer are dying on lengthy wait lists or waiting too long to get the care they need while their cancer worsens.
Many are faced with the devastating choice of putting food on the table or taking on significant debt as they struggle to afford the out-of-pocket costs that come with a cancer diagnosis. This includes thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs for take-home cancer medications not publicly covered in Ontario, but covered almost everywhere else in the country.
“As we face an affordability crisis, Ontarians living with cancer are facing devastating out-of-pocket costs including $4,000 – $8,000 per month, in some cases, to pay for the take-home cancer medications they need,” said Christina Sit, Manager of Community at the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada and co-chair of the Cancer Action Now Alliance. “We are calling on the Ontario government to follow through on the promise they made in 2022 and improve access to take-home cancer medications.”
Cancer advocates are calling on the Ontario government to:
1. Release Ontario’s renewed cancer plan and commit to yearly progress reports.
2. Follow through on the commitment made in Ontario’s 2022 Budget to urgently explore models that improve access to take-home cancer medications.
3. Commit to advancing protected leave for workers dealing with critical illnesses such as cancer.
4. Develop an action plan to get cancer treatments to patients faster, working in close collaboration with patient representatives.
Important signs of progress will be when we see more Ontarians diagnosed with early-stage cancer, fewer diagnosed with late-stage cancer, and those living with cancer not just surviving but thriving. This will mean our cancer care system is truly responsive to patient needs and living up to the world-class promise that it has.
Cancer Action Now Alliance
Cancer Action Now is a national alliance of patient organizations, professional associations, and life science companies who are witnessing the magnitude of the problem our cancer care systems and its patients are facing. We have come together to call on governments to address the issues in our cancer care systems so that Canadians with cancer have a chance to live longer, better lives than anywhere else in the world.