This week Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) was pleased to welcome our local MP (Islington South) and the Shadow Foreign Secretary, Emily Thornberry, to the MAP-supported Dunya Women’s Cancer Centre in Ramallah.
Emily Thornberry MP was in the West Bank on a visit organised by Labour Friends of Palestine and the Middle East (LFPME). She was joined by fellow Labour MPs Andy Slaughter and Fabian Hamilton on a two-day tour to witness the many challenges to human rights faced by Palestinians living under half a century of occupation.
The Dunya Centre is the only community-based clinic in the West Bank specialising in breast and gynaecological cancer. With MAP’s support, the clinic cares for around 1,900 Palestinian women each year, providing a range of specialised services including diagnostic ultrasound and mammography, physiotherapy and psychological counselling.
At the centre, Emily Thornberry and the delegation heard from staff about the many challenges to accessing adequate and timely cancer care faced by Palestinian women. These include limited availability of diagnostic services, a lack of public health information about cancer, and restrictions to freedom of movement imposed by Israel, particularly to East Jerusalem where the only Palestinian hospital providing radiotherapy is situated.
MAP’s CEO, Aimee Shalan, who accompanied the delegation said:
“We were delighted to introduce the local MP for our London office and her parliamentary colleagues to one of our partners in West Bank. The excellent work of the MAP-supported Dunya Centre demonstrates some of the best practice in cancer care that we hope all Palestinians will one day be able to access. The experiences of Dunya’s staff and patients also clearly show the political barriers to this vision, and how Israel’s occupation severely impacts on women and healthcare. It is vital that MPs from the UK are able to witness this reality, in order to inform debate on how the UK can best support Palestinians’ rights to health and dignity.”
This visit follows soon after another British MP, Dr Philippa Whitford, visited the West Bank and Gaza with MAP as part of our newly-launched breast cancer programme. Alongside a medical delegation from the UK and local Palestinian surgeons, Dr Whitford provided trainings on recent developments in cancer treatment and undertook a series of operations for women affected by breast cancer.
For Breast Cancer Month in October, MAP released a new animation highlighting the many challenges faced by women in Gaza affected by breast cancer. The film follows ‘Deema’, a woman from Gaza, as she tries to access treatment and care but faces barriers at every stage, including diagnosis, chemotherapy, surgery, radiotherapy and recovery.
These barriers include severe restrictions on exit from Gaza for essential care, including radiotherapy which is completely unavailable inside Gaza. Nearly half (46%) of all medical patients’ requests to Israel for permits to exit Gaza for treatment have been delayed or denied so far in 2017. At least five Palestinian women from Gaza lost their lives to breast cancer in 2017 after being denied exit for care.
To learn more about breast cancer care in the occupied Palestinian territory visit: map.org.uk/breastcancer