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September 11th, 2014

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Over 300 Danish kidney cancer patients die each year simply because they live in Denmark instead of Norway or Sweden. The chances of living longer than five years with kidney cancer in Denmark are less than 50-50, while three out of four manage to survive that long in Sweden and Norway, according to figures from the Nordic cancer database, NORDCAN.

Leif Vestergaard Pedersen – the head of Kræftens Bekæmpelse, the national cancer society – expressed outrage that the 700 Danes diagnosed with kidney cancer each year receive Scandinavia's worst treatment.

"It is terribly frustrating that Danish kidney cancer patients endure this,” Pedersen told Metroxpress. “We need to take a hard look at the differences and why the treatments are failing.”

A half century in last past
NORDCAN’s figures revealed that Denmark has been consistently last when it comes to survival rates over the past 50 years – and it has fallen even further behind since the turn of the century.

“We need political focus on why we continue to lag behind,” said Pedersen. “It is useless for us to believe that we are at the top, when the data clearly shows we are at the bottom.”

READ MORE: Mortality rate in hospitals twice as high on weekends and holidays

Danish kidney cancer patients suffer a worse fate than those in almost all of Europe. A study of the five-year survival rates showed that only Bulgaria had a lower number of surviving patients.

Health minister calls for changes
In Bulgaria, 44.2 percent of patients made it five years, while just 44.8 did so in Denmark.

Nick Hækkerup, the minister of health, wants improvements to be made to treatment that is costing the lives of 300 Danes each year.

“The government is submitting a five billion kroner health package – a large part of which is dedicated to improving cancer treatment, including kidney cancer – in Denmark,” Hækkerup told Metroxpress.