By Asma’u Ahmad
A medical doctor, Dr. Daniel Mwanmut has called on Federal Government and 36 state governors to avail rural farmers access to free cancer screening.
Dr. Mwanmut, a retired medical officer with the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), told newsmen in Jos, that many farmers in Wubel Village in Mangu North Local Government Area of the state suffer from one form of cancer or the other.
The medical doctor, who champions an anti-poverty and cancer campaign, said he had discovered no fewer than 15 such cases of persons living with cancer among rural farmers in Plateau South Senatorial Zone.
He said the campaign was motivated by the urgent need to raise funds for the farmers to go for cancer screening as most of them had resorted to self help by relying on local herbs as cancer screening was expensive.
He said: “Cancer screening is very expensive and the only way farmers who live below poverty level can access such screening will be through government assistance or collective efforts.
“In this regard, we have mobilised farmers in the area to contribute 500,000 tubers of yam to be retailed at the cost of N1, 500 per tuber to raise N500 million as an interim measure to sponsor their screening in hospitals. The long term measure is to have cancer screening centres in each local government area for early detection.”
Mwanmut appealed to wealthy donors in Plateau to buy into the initiative by buying off the yams at N1, 500 per tuber to realise the amount.
