Fed: Cancer research blocked in Qld

AAP General News (Australia)
04-18-2008
Fed: Cancer research blocked in Qld

SYDNEY, April 18 AAP - The Cancer Council of Queensland has launched unprecedented
legal action to gain access to a register of cancer sufferers to help research.

The council has initiated the action in Brisbane's Supreme Court to enable independent
study of the disease, including blocked work into why survival rates are lower in regional
and rural Queensland, The Australian reports.

Scientists believe the study may embarrass Queensland Health because it is likely to
reveal detection and treatment standards are failing outside of Brisbane, the newspaper
reports.

Queensland is the only state in Australia, and one of the few jurisdictions in the
Western world, where researchers require case-by-case approval to access the cancer register
for the development of prevention and treatment strategies.

Queensland Health has refused to release localised cancer statistics and has failed
to fund the collation of data on the stages that cancers are being discovered in different
areas.

Documents obtained by The Australian show that some of Australia's leading scientists
- including former Australian of the Year Ian Frazer - have repeatedly appealed to Premier
Anna Bligh and Health Minister Stephen Robertson to grant routine access to the data.

AAP pc/it

KEYWORD: CANCER

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