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Tuesday, May 4, 2021
New Zealand conservation minister and Member of Parliament for East Coast Kiri Allan is highlighting the disparity of health outcomes between M?ori after being diagnosed with stage 3 cervical cancer.
In an interview with The Hui on 3 May 2021, she told of the disparity between M?ori and white women, with M?ori women being 4 times more likely to die from cervical cancer. Allan said that “Do the maths on that. I don’t know why that is, how that is, but it’s wrong. The disparity is too much, people are dying far too young. This is a korero [conversation] that needs to happen again and again and again.” She also explained that she was told in regards to her own diagnosis that “for somebody with stage 3C you have a 40 percent chance of survival. As a w?hine M?ori [M?ori woman], I have about a 13.3 percent chance of survival”.
A 2009 study published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health concluded that “M?ori continue to have higher incidence and mortality than non-M?ori from cervical cancer although disparities are improving.” Data from 1996 to 2005 cited in the study supported this claim, with the rate of death for M?ori cervical cancer patients being higher in each year.
Allan publicly announced her diagnosis on April 5, 2021, taking medical leave from her ministerial and electorate roles. She encouraged women to take regular pap smear tests, calling for people to “encourage your sisters, your mothers, your daughters, your friends – please #SmearYourMea”. #SmearYourMea is a campaign that was started by the now-deceased Talei Morrison, a kapa haka performer who suffered from cervical cancer. Mea is the M?ori word for “thing” referring, in this context, to genitalia.
Medical journal The Lancet published an editorial piece in early May 2021 criticising the disparity of M?ori in regards to cervical cancer, and citing Allan’s case as illustrative of such disparities. The piece urged the New Zealand government to “improve engagement with M?ori and other minority groups and to take responsibility for protecting the health of all their citizens by expanding accessibility of cancer services to all members of society, irrespective of their ethnic origin”.