Indonesia's Challenges To Increase The Life Rate Of Cancer Patients In Children

JAKARTA Uneven access and infrastructure of health facilities make the survival rate or level of cancer in children in Indonesia far behind developed countries. Head of the Hematology-Oncology Coordination Work Unit of the Indonesian Pediatrician Association (IDAI) Eddy Supriyadi admitted that he often found cancer that it had entered the final stage phase of pediatric patients.

The number of Indonesian children aged 0-14 years who suffer from cancer is quite high. According to data from the World Health Organization (WHO) through the International Agency for Cancer Research (IARC) estimates that there are 8,677 Indonesian children at that age who will suffer from cancer in 2020.

This number is the highest compared to countries in Southeast Asia.

Cancer is one of the nine priority disease-type services with the highest national morbidity and death rates set by the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Indonesia.

"But often cancer sufferers come in late conditions, the number of cancers in children increases every year due to the difficulty of detecting cancer in children," said dr. Dita Windarofah, Sp.A. M.Sc in 2023.

The statement was agreed by dr. Eddy Supriyadi. Cancer patients in children are often found when entering the final stage phase, making it difficult to treat the healing.

"If we do it, we don't know about the children, because of what reason, we usually get at the stage at the site. So if there is a stage, for example, our stage is divided by 4, we must be almost sure or mostly, in stages 3 and 4," said Eddy in an online discussion entitled Kanker to Children: Why Is It Important?, Tuesday (4/2/2025).

Because it comes in a final stage of patient condition, the level of survival rate of cancer in children in developing countries such as Indonesia is only about 24 percent.

This figure is far below the average developed country whose survival rate is up to 80 percent. The cause of the survival rate of cancer patients in Indonesia is lagging behind developed countries, one of which is due to uneven health infrastructure.

The fact that only 20 percent of children (cankers) survived in developing countries must be faced. And what causes cancer in Indonesia to be so sad? Because the health infrastructure is not evenly distributed," he said.

Regions such as Papua, Maluku, East Nusa Tenggara, and West Nusa Tenggara, said Eddy, do not even have cancer facilities, because most cancer service centers are spread across Java Island.

In addition, in Indonesia, various facilities and infrastructure are still not sufficient, including physical facilities, budgets, and child cancer registration. Supportive care or an ideal support service for cancer treatment is still lacking. Although it is not supported by equitable infrastructure, Eddy said improvements in cancer services in children must continue to be improved.

WHO targets an increase in the survival rate of child cancer sufferers globally by up to 60 percent by 2030. Meanwhile, Indonesia, with current infrastructure and medical personnel constraints, is targeting 50 percent by 2030.

To achieve this target, the government and various related parties need to increase public education regarding the importance of awareness of child cancer symptoms so that early detection can be carried out more effectively.

Please note, the high number of cancer survivors in children in developed countries is also determined due to better detection factors. More adequate and quality facilities cause detection to be carried out more quickly, thus supporting proper and fast handling as well.

Through early detection, cancer can be diagnosed immediately and therapy can be given in early conditions.

"Prognosis of cancer that can be recognized early and treated from the start is certainly much better than end-stage cancer or advanced stages. The government's free health examination program is expected to be one of the moments for early detection of children," he said. Chairman of the Indonesian Pediatrician Association Piprim Basarah Yanuario.

But as mentioned earlier, cancer patients in children often come to the hospital in late stages. This means that early detection of cancer in children is still low. The number of reported cases of child cancer is also believed to be far from the number of estimated cases in Indonesia.

Every year, Indonesia is estimated to have around 10,000 new cases of cancer in children. However, the child registration system or IPCAR noted that in 2022 to 2023 there were only around 2,000 new cases.

"Where are the rest? Maybe they didn't get to the health facility or had died in the middle of the road, or were wrongly diagnosed. There are still many possibilities," explained Eddy.

Meanwhile, fire is still a nightmare for Indonesian children. This disease is known to be ranked first as the most common type of cancer that attacks children, even reaching more than half of the total cases of cancer in children in the country.

It is not known for certain the cause of the high number of cases in children, although there are many theories that try to explain it, ranging from allegations of radiation exposure to the influence of pesticides.

"There is a theory whether due to radiation, whether due to chemical (chemical), there is a pesticide theory, there is even research that states that the risk of children suffering from cancer is higher if they do not get breast milk," said Eddy.