Three districts across the country have lowered the age for bowel cancer screening eligiblity for Māori and Pacific to 50 years old but the rest of the country has kept it at 60.
A Māori bowel cancer medical advisor says this causes risk for many Māori and Pacific people, who are more likely to have bowel cancer before the eligible age for screening.
Early screening can find and prevent bowel cancer from advancing.
A Māori bowel cancer advisor, Professor Sue Crengle, is pushing for the rest of the country to get on board.
“It’s our right to have equal benefit from a health programme and doing that would help us have equal benefit. So that’s a right that we have,” she says.
Te Whatu Ora research finds a higher proportion of bowel cancer in Māori and Pacific peoples occurs before the eligible screening age of 60 (approximately 21 percent compared to 10 percent for non-Māori non-Pacific peoples).
Crengle says she is frightened that if the eligibility testing age remains so high, Māori will continue to pay the price.
“Our death rate from bowel cancer is higher and so that’s why it’s really important that we get good access to the bowel cancer screening programme.”
Since 2017 a project aimed at people self-screening for bowel cancer was introduced and has seen more cancer cases identified. But Crengle says this push for lowering the age of screening eligibility isn’t just about equity.
“When you look at our bowel cancer mortality and that we get bowel cancer at a younger age, then if you’re interested in need, then starting us screening at 50 is a needs-based approach as well.”
The three regions to have lowered the eligibility screening age are Waikato, Te Tairāwhiti and Mid-Central, and Crengle encourages Māori to get a screen test.
“It’s much better to do bowel screening and either get rid of the polyps, which are the little growths that might become a cancer. Or, if you’ve got a bowel cancer, to have it diagnosed early when you can be cured and be around for your whānau.”