From the editorial
Newspaper La Jornada
Thursday February 16, 2023, p. fifteen
In Mexico, 7,000 cases of children with cancer are registered annually, a disease that represents the second cause of death in this sector, reported specialists from the Children’s Hospital of Mexico Federico Gómez (HIMFG) and the National Institute of Pediatrics (INP), on the occasion of the International Childhood Cancer Day (February 15).
The most frequent neoplasms in childhood are acute leukemias, lymphomas and those of the central nervous system, stated Félix Gaytán Morales, a specialist attached to the HIMFG Hemato-Oncology service.
He explained that among the factors that influence the evolution or cure of the disease, the type of tumor is counted, if there is a timely diagnosis, adequate treatment and if there is a support network for the clinical follow-up of the patients.
Information from the National Center for the Health of Children and Adolescents of the Ministry of Health shows that, on average, between 50 and 60 percent of those affected are relieved.
Marco Rodrigo Aguilar Ortiz, head of the INP’s Pediatric Oncology Service, commented that children usually have a greater chance of overcoming the disease than adults, because half of the cases are acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a type of cancer with high chances of healing because it is less aggressive.
Meanwhile, the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) presented the Translational Research Program called The fight against childhood cancer through research
which has the purpose of strengthening the early and effective approach to the disease, through scientific knowledge and its educational and technological transfer, informed the director of the institute, Zoé Robledo.
Through a video message that was transmitted during the presentation of the strategy at the National Academy of Medicine, the official commented that 2,000 new cases of childhood cancer are detected every year in the IMSS, attention that historically was focused on Mexico City , Guadalajara and Monterrey.
That is why the decision to bring highly specialized medicine to the entire country and to date the institute already has 35 Pediatric Care State Reference Centers, in which the alliance between scientific research and medical care is formalized.
