The Federal Government has announced plans to expand cancer prevention and treatment infrastructure, including the procurement of 25 additional linear accelerators between 2027 and 2029, as part of efforts to strengthen Nigeria’s response to the growing cancer burden.
The Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr Iziaq Adekunle Salako, disclosed this on Tuesday at the National Cancer Control Plan (NCCP) Technical Working Group and Global Advisory Council meeting in Abuja.
The meeting also provided an opportunity for the Federal Government and its partners to review progress under the National Cancer Control Plan and strengthen coordinated action towards improved prevention, early detection, treatment, research and survivorship care in Nigeria.
Salako said the Federal Government was prioritising cancer prevention through vaccination, screening and early detection, while expanding treatment capacity under the National Cancer Control Plan 2026–2030.
He said the burden of cancer was particularly severe in Nigeria because patients often present late, while the country continues to face limitations in infrastructure, manpower and financial resources.
“When it comes to Africa and Nigeria, the challenge is particularly heavier because presentation is usually late, fatality is usually high, infrastructure is limited, manpower is limited, and resources are limited,” Salako said.
According to him, the government inaugurated the NCCP Technical Working Group to drive implementation of the 2026–2030 plan, with partnership at the centre of the strategy.
He said the Global Advisory Council would provide expertise, experience, knowledge and international networks to support Nigeria’s cancer-control agenda.
Salako said President Bola Tinubu had demonstrated commitment to prevention by approving routine human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination as part of the country’s immunisation schedule.
“The President particularly continues to emphasise prioritising prevention. That is why one of the very first things he did was to approve that routinely, HPV vaccination should be part of our immunization schedule,” he said.
He added that the government was also strengthening hepatitis vaccination, expanding cervical cancer screening through the Cervical Cancer Elimination Council and integrating screening services into primary healthcare facilities to promote early detection.
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“Prevention is better and cheaper than cure,” Salako said.
On treatment infrastructure, the minister said the government had commenced the construction of six Cancer Centres of Excellence across the country, with three already completed and work ongoing on the remaining three.
He further disclosed that the President had approved the procurement of 25 additional linear accelerators between 2027 and 2029.
“Recently, the President approved that between 2027 and 2029, the country should procure an additional 25 linear accelerators. We are executing a three-year plan to achieve this,” Salako said.
He said the expansion was aimed at ensuring that cancer patients who require treatment would have access to appropriate facilities.
The minister also formally inaugurated the Blood Cancer Consortium, following a donation of equipment and other resources to strengthen pathology laboratories.
“On this note, I formally pronounce the Blood Cancer Consortium inaugurated—for the benefit of Nigerians and all humanity, for the advancement of knowledge, and to ensure that ultimately, as the human race, we eliminate blood cancer,” he said.
The President of the Nigerian Cancer Society, Prof. Abidemi Omonisi, commended the Federal Government for what he described as a significant shift towards coordinated action in cancer control.
Omonisi said one of the major challenges that had affected cancer control in Nigeria over the years was the tendency of stakeholders to work in silos, resulting in duplication of efforts and poor coordination.
He said the new approach under the NCCP Technical Working Group was beginning to change the situation by bringing government agencies, researchers, clinicians, development partners and cancer organisations together around a common national agenda.
According to him, Nigeria had invested significantly in cancer prevention and control, but the impact had been limited by fragmented interventions and inadequate coordination among stakeholders.
Omonisi commended Salako for providing leadership and maintaining engagement with stakeholders, saying the minister’s approach represented a departure from the fragmented system of the past.
He said the growing international attention being attracted to Nigeria’s cancer-control programme was an indication that the country was beginning to demonstrate a model worthy of global partnership.
Omonisi also stressed the importance of sustaining the momentum created by the Technical Working Group and ensuring that international partnerships translated into tangible benefits for Nigerian patients, institutions and researchers.
He said the involvement of the Nigerian diaspora and international cancer institutions would provide opportunities to strengthen research, technology transfer, capacity building and access to modern cancer-care services.
Earlier, the Chair of the NCCP Technical Working Group, Prof. Folakemi Odedina, said the group had moved from planning to implementation of the national cancer-control strategy.
Odedina said the group had brought together government, academia, civil servants, patients, advocates, survivors, industry and international partners under a coordinated national cancer-control agenda.
“We have moved from organization to implementation within a very short period of time,” she said.
She said activities were already advancing across prevention, early detection, treatment and patient navigation, survivorship and palliative care, cancer research and clinical trials, workforce development, cancer data and digital health, community engagement, monitoring and implementation.
Odedina said the Global Advisory Council was bringing expertise in cancer prevention, treatment, clinical trials, genomics, implementation science, workforce development, health equity, data and artificial intelligence.
She disclosed that the group was also developing a stronger national oncology clinical trials ecosystem to train Nigerian investigators, strengthen trial-ready institutions and improve patient access to clinical trials.
“We intend to produce trained people, stronger institutions in Nigeria, better research, expanded clinical trials, improved technologies, greater access to care, and ultimately better outcomes for Nigerian cancer patients,” she said.
Odedina also highlighted the importance of addressing social determinants of health, noting that medical treatment alone would not guarantee better outcomes if patients could not afford transportation, nutrition or accommodation while receiving care.
The Global Advisory Council Director at the University of Maryland Greenebaum Cancer Center, Baltimore, Prof. Taofeek Owonikoko, said the partnership would help eliminate duplication of efforts among international institutions working on cancer in Nigeria.
Owonikoko, who described himself as both Nigerian and American, said the partners were committed to learning from Nigeria as well as contributing their expertise.
He said a framework bringing the various institutions together would help ensure that interventions were strategically aligned with Nigeria’s priorities.
“This framework that we’re putting together today really serves a lot of purposes, most importantly to channel our efforts strategically, so that we’re all pulling in the same direction and we avoid duplicative effort,” he said.
Owonikoko said the 2030 cancer-free Nigeria target should be viewed as a long-term pathway requiring the development of the tools, platforms and strategies necessary to eventually achieve that goal.
“I’m very convinced that the 2030 cancer-free Nigeria is not going to be a slogan. While we may not make Nigeria cancer-free in 2030, I think we would have created the tools and the platform and the strategies that will ensure that we eventually become cancer-free,” he said.
The Director of the VCU Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center, Prof. Monica Baskin, said community engagement would remain central to her contribution to the initiative.
Baskin, a behavioural scientist whose research focuses on community outreach and community-based research, said cancer-control solutions must be developed with communities.
“The problems as well as the solutions are in the community,” she said, adding that she expected to learn from Nigeria while contributing to the partnership.
Also speaking, Dr Lewis Roberts of Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center highlighted the need for greater attention to liver, pancreatic and biliary tract cancers in Africa.
Roberts said liver cancer was a major cause of cancer deaths on the continent and often affected people at relatively young ages.
“Liver cancer is one of the major causes of cancer death in Africa. Across the continent, it’s the number three cause of death from cancer,” Roberts said.
He advocated stronger screening, identification and treatment of people living with viral hepatitis, as well as vaccination as a means of preventing liver cancer.
A representative of the Africa-Americas consortium said the group would initially focus on improving cancer diagnosis through digital pathology.
He said the consortium had brought together pathologists from Nigeria and Ghana and donated a digital scanner that would enable pathology slides to be scanned and reviewed remotely by specialists.
“All you need is electricity and an iPhone to make them work, and you can scan a slide, send it up to the cloud, and anywhere in the world a pathologist can review it together and come up with better ways to diagnose and understand cancer,” he said.
The Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, Kachollom Daju, welcomed members of the Technical Working Group and Global Advisory Council, describing their collaboration as an opportunity to strengthen Nigeria’s cancer-control efforts.
She expressed the ministry’s readiness to support implementation of the NCCP and collaboration with international partners.
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