The Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) officials have asked the government to declare cancer a national disaster.
Speaking on Wednesday at the home of the union’s first vice national chairman, the late Stanley Mutai, the officials led by Nandi KNUT branch executive secretary Boniface Tenai said the government should set aside enough resources to fight the illness.
Tenai said many people in the country have been diagnosed with cancer and there was an urgent need for action on the disease.
He said when HIV/AIDS and COVID-19 struck the country, drugs and vaccines were immediately found and wondered why it had taken long before cancer medication was found.
He was flanked by his Bomet county counterpart Malel Langat who appealed to the National Assembly to come up with a Bill supporting the management of cancer.
Malel said the disease was too expensive to treat and that many families have been rendered poor after disposing of all their assets to gather for the medication of cancer patients.
Mutai succumbed to cancer while undergoing treatment at the Nairobi hospital on Sunday.
He will be buried at his Chepngobob home on the outskirts of Brooke trading centre on September 16.
