Statement by TUV North Antrim candidate Timothy Gaston:
“There isn’t a family in Northern Ireland who doesn’t know what it is like to have been visited by cancer.
“Every day thirty people in our Province are diagnosed with the disease and each year 4,000 people in Northern Ireland die from cancer. It equates to 1 in 4 of all deaths here yet Northern Ireland lags behind other regions of the UK when it comes to this issue.
“A workforce census in 2014 revealed that Northern Ireland has the lowest level of provision of Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNS) in the UK. Currently while most breast and lung cancer patients have access to a CNS there is considerable variation with one in four patients missing out.
“TUV has consistently highlighted the waste and squander which typify Stormont misrule and we believe that a top priority of the newly elected Assembly should be guaranteed adequate funding to ensure all cancer patients in Northern Ireland have access to a Clinical Nurse Specialist. We also want to ensure that Stormont provides universal access to NICE approved drugs.
“Finally, while no one would suggest that it is possible to abolish waiting lists it is important that they are managed effectively, particularly when it comes to a disease like cancer. TUV will fight to ensure that there is full compliance with the Ministerial Targets for Cancer. This would mean 95% of patients with an urgent referral for cancer would begin treatment within 62 days; 98% of patients commencing first treatment within 31 days of the decision to treat being taken and 100% of patents with an urgent breast cancer referral being seen within 14 days.”