Wafaa M Rashed/LinkedIn
Jun 2, 2025, 09:25
Wafaa M Rashed: Childhood Cancer Must Be on the Global NCD agenda
Wafaa M Rashed, Faculty Lecturer of pharmacy at the Ahram Canadian University, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“Childhood Cancer Cannot Be an Afterthought.
As the world prepares for the Fourth High-Level Meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on NCDs and Mental Health (September 2025), the current Zero Draft of the Political Declaration is making progress—but it fails to explicitly mention childhood cancer.
This is not just an oversight. It’s a gap that costs lives.
– Each year, 400,000 children are diagnosed with cancer—most of them in low- and middle-income countries where access to timely diagnosis and care remains a distant dream.
– The WHO Global Initiative on Childhood Cancer set a global survival target of 60% by 2030. Are we on track if we can’t even say the words “childhood cancer” in high-level UN declarations?As a researcher and advocate, I stand with many who are calling for immediate action to:
– Include childhood cancer and other catastrophic diseases in the global NCD agenda.
– Recognize the unique needs of children—not as miniature adults, but as a vulnerable population with specific biological, social, and policy needs.
– Ensure the voices of affected families, survivors, and pediatric oncology experts are not just heard—but centered.This is a matter of global health equity, human rights, and scientific responsibility.
I support the proposal to amend the Zero Draft with a paragraph committing Member States to:“Include children with catastrophic diseases like sickle cell into the NCD agenda and achieve the childhood cancer survival target of at least 60% globally by 2030, as set out by the WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer.”
– If we don’t name the issue, we won’t solve it.
– Children with cancer are not too few to matter.
– They are not too complex to count.
– They must not be left behind.Wafaa M. Rashed, PhD
Chair and Founder of Pna-African PGS Education and Research (PAPERI).”
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