The European Cancer Patient’s Bill of Rights will be launched at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 4 February 2014, coinciding with the World Cancer Day.

The launch is hosted by the European Cancer Concord (ECC) and European Cancer Patient Coalition (ECPC) in association with the Members of the European Parliament Against Cancer (MAC) Group.

MPE, being one of the ECC Partners, welcomes the launch of the Cancer Patient’s Bill of Rights which is the result of over two years of work and widespread engagement led by the European Cancer Concord (ECC).

The European Cancer Patient’s Bill of Rights aims to tackle the inequalities that currently exist in cancer care between European countries and it calls for a commitment to tackle the cancer epidemic in Europe which will result in the death of 1 cancer patient every 10 seconds in the next 20-25 years.

The bill of rights is based on three key principles:

• the right of every European citizen to receive accurate information and be involved in their own care;
• the right of every European citizen to access specialised cancer care underpinned by research and innovation;
• the right of every European citizen to cost-effective health systems that ensure optimum cancer outcomes.

Prof Sarper Diler, the president of MPE said ” We are all proud and happy that The European Cancer Patient’s Bill of Rights becomes a reality after a long and tiring marathon. With this charter the Rights of cancer patients will be given the visibility and priority they deserve. It will lead to better startegeies at local, national and at the European level to deal with current inequalities of cancer treatment and care. The challenge now is to turn the possibilities of this charter into reality so that patients actually benefit”.

Read the full ECC press release here.

The Lancet Oncology article can be found here.

For further questions, please contact plate@mpeurope.org