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E.O.E Newsletter | www.huanet.gr
Leyen announced Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan. The first day that I heard that, I said: “If you take seriously that you want to beat cancer, and you don’t do anything about the most common male cancer, which is prostate cancer, then you can’t mean what you say. So, we need to do something about it.” Then, the Commission ordered the Scientific Advice for Policy from European Academics (SAPEA) and asked them to do a literature search and to speak with stakeholders, like ourselves, radiologists, oncologists, patients, epidemiologists, economists and to the industry, in order to make an advice to the Commission regarding prostate, lung and gastric cancer screening. As a result, there was an advice to the Commission, arising from strong evidence, that prostate, lung and gastric cancer screening, as we propose it today, will decrease mortality and morbidity from these cancer types. The Commission transferred this information to the Council and the Council drafted the new recommendations. This is the way it works. So, it has taken 20 years, between 2003 and 2023 to finally include prostate, lung and gastric cancer in the screening recommendations of the EU. This is a very complex procedure, that I have learned during all these years. Most importantly, I have understood how to open doors, through which we can reach out to these people, talk to them and convince them of what we think is right.
There are now recommendations from the European Commission, that all the member states should start piloting to see whether it is feasible and cost-effective to start PSA screening. This is important for Greece. You have a lower incidence than the average in the European Union, but still, it’s the second incidence male cancer, after lung cancer. There are more men suffering from prostate cancer, than from colorectal cancer. Lung cancer today is 18.7% of cancers, prostate cancer is 17.1% and if less people are going to smoke in Greece, prostate cancer will become number one, just like it is in Sweden today. So, it is an important health problem. This is the incidence. When it comes to mortality, lung and colorectal cancer kill more men in Greece than prostate cancer. But still, it is the third male-killing cancer today. You know that we can cure the disease, if we find it early and we can’t cure the disease if we find it too late. Moreover, it is hugely expensive to treat metastatic
and castrate resistant prostate cancer. So, there is a rationale also in Greece, with the lower incidence and the not so frequently killing cancer, to start a pilot study. Your country will be contacted and we are in contact with Thanos Dellis for the Hellenic Urological Association (HUA), to see how we are going to do something about helping you to start a pilot study. Let’s say some 10.000 to 15.000 men in a certain area will receive an invitation to have a PSA sampled and then we will follow our algorithm to see which are the next steps. We hope that we will have the support also from the Hellenic Urological Association to get this implemented. Your mortality is low, the lowest in Europe is in Italy, second lowest is in Spain, third lowest is in Malta and fourth lowest is in Greece. If you have seen prostate cancer patients dying, you realise that every death from prostate cancer is one too much, a terrible end of life story. And we know the we can reduce prostate cancer mortality very significantly by population-based organised screening. I think, the policy makers in Greece also need to be aware of what prostate cancer means.
F.N.: Have you ever visited Greece? Can you name your favorite place?
H.vP.: I can tell you, that my wife and I had our honeymoon in Greece. I got married in 1975 and we flew to Athens first. We stayed in Vouliagmeni, which I found a fantastic place. It was wonderful! We were there for a couple of days and then we went to Kos, where we saw the island of Hippocrates, also a wonderful experience. Then, we went back to Athens, in the city centre, for a few more days. I have been visiting Greece more often. A place that I liked very much was Creta, where we had an EBU meeting. I think it was chaired by Frank Sofras. Moutzouris was the EBU representative of Greece and I have met him at that time already. In 2008, I was in Chalkidiki. We had a Congress, I think of the Hellenic Genitourinary Cancer Group, with Constandinides. And we are in contact with the Hellenic Urological Association and Thanos Dellis, about the screening program. But if you ask me, the place I would go back to, is probably Vouliagmeni!
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