This NAIDOC Week I am very pleased to join our Senior Executive and the Independent Directors of the VCCC Alliance to publicly support the ‘Yes’ vote in the upcoming national referendum to establish an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament.
We celebrate and continue to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander-led decision-making in cancer control. Despite considerable progress in improving national cancer outcomes, we are acutely aware the gap in cancer-related mortality between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and non-Indigenous Australians is widening.
We believe that recognising self-determination and an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament will catalyse broader change that will contribute to improved cancer treatment, care, and outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Personally, I am deeply affected by the data. As this striking graphic on cancer mortality shows, over time we’re looking at steady improvement for non-Indigenous Australians, with the opposite trend for Indigenous Australians.
Source: Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2018
Extensive research highlights that self-determination is an enabler to improve health outcomes for First Nations peoples and this is the underpinning of our position.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ health status is linked to ‘control over their physical environment, of dignity, of community self-esteem, and of justice. It is not merely a matter of the provision of doctors, hospitals, medicines or the absence of disease and incapacity’ ( ).
More recently, The Lancet editorial argued “Any attempt to address the health inequities of Indigenous peoples will require governments to…enact and enforce the rights of Indigenous peoples to self-determination and territorial sovereignty.”
We have an opportunity to change the way lifelong healthcare occurs for First Nations people in our country, and I believe the Voice to Parliament will provide an important means to bring these issues to the fore and ultimately help to address the disparities in outcomes.
The theme for NAIDOC Week this year is For Our Elders, so it was a pleasure to host this week’s Monday Lunch Livestream exploring how to improve cancer prevention, treatment and care with and for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders.
We were fortunate to have a very impressive all-Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander line-up of speakers, and it was very exciting to see so many effective, culturally appropriate programs and activities already underway and having an impact for communities.
These programs showcase an innovative shift and send a strong message about the importance of self-determination and cultural safety in healthcare. I personally love The Beautiful Shawl Project spearheaded by VACCHO, which allows Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women access to culturally safe and accessible breast screening, and it’s great to see such leadership in Victoria. We should all be very proud of this work.
Our upcoming Research Conference is now fast approaching. If you haven’t already done so, I’d encourage you to consider submitting an abstract here before the deadline at 11.59pm tonight. We’ve already received dozens but we really want to see wide representation from across disciplines and organisations. This is Victoria’s foremost multidisciplinary cancer research conference, and abstract submissions are open to cancer researchers from across Australia.
In further exciting news, I’m delighted to invite you to attend the third World Indigenous Cancer Conference in March 2024 here in Melbourne, hosted by the VCCC Alliance in partnership with the International Agency for Research on Cancer. The theme of the 2024 conference is Process, Progress, Power.
The conference will bring together researchers, public health practitioners, clinicians, nurses, advocacy groups, allied health and other related professionals, and Indigenous community groups and leaders from around the globe to discuss the latest research findings and encourage high-quality cancer research.
This three-day conference will also provide an opportunity for participants to foster new collaborations, enhance capacity, and share knowledge and information about cancer and Indigenous people internationally.
The program will encompass topics and focus areas across the cancer continuum, from prevention and screening to survivorship and palliative care. You can register your interest here to stay in the loop with key dates.
I am thrilled to welcome Melissa Le Mesurier as the new Chair of our Cancer Consumer Advisory Committee and I look forward to this role complementing her other leadership positions in the cancer sector, including at the Lung Foundation Australia and the Australian and New Zealand Urological and Prostate Cancer Trials Group (ANZUP).
I’d like to publicly congratulate Professor Doug Hilton AO on his appointment as the new Chief Executive of CSIRO. Doug’s appointment comes after a monumental 14 years as Director of WEHI and a significant stint as a VCCC Alliance Director, and is testament to the quality of science we foster here in Victoria. Doug remains a Fellow of the VCCC Alliance and we look forward to a continued association with him as he embarks on the next chapter of his career.
I was deeply honoured to be acknowledged as an Officer of the Order of Australia in the recent King’s Birthday Honours List and would like to publicly congratulate my fellow appointees from the cancer sector:
Professor Grant McArthur AO
Executive Director
