Senators backed the suggestion to establish an endowment fund for cancer-stricken overseas Filipino workers dedicated to the late Migrant Workers Secretary Ma. Susana "Toots" Ople recently died due to breast cancer.

Senator Christopher "Bong" Go, who chairs the upper chamber's committee on health, has expressed full support for the creation of a cancer endowment fund, as suggested by Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri, that would greatly help cancer patients across the country.

Go was instrumental in securing a P500-million allocation for the Cancer Assistance Fund or CAF in the 2023 General Appropriations Act of the Department of Health.

This was after, he noted that DoH did not include any allocation for the CAF in its proposed 2023 budget. This concern was raised in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

During the National Cancer Summit in February this year, Philippine Society of Medical Oncology president, Dr. Rosario Pitargue, reported that cancer is now the third leading cause of death nationwide, with lung cancer as the top cause of mortality, followed by liver, breast, colon, and prostate.

There are 184 cases diagnosed in 100,000 patients and 96 deaths related to cancer are reported daily.

Based on the estimates by the Glocal Cancer Observatory, about 153,751 Filipinos suffered from various types of cancer in 2020, with 27,163 patients diagnosed with breast cancer, 19,180 lung cancer patients, and 17,364 colorectum cancer patients.

Hence, Go is pushing to double the current allocation of the DoH for the CAF in its 2024 GAA so the government could extend assistance to more cancer patients.