Joint efforts against cancer: National cancer strategy (2025–2035)

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This strategy is intended to lay the foundations for further improving the high quality of Norwegian cancer care.

Despite the fact that more people are diagnosed with cancer, more make a full recovery. Many people with cancer live longer and with a better quality of life than cancer patients in the past. This is due to a combination of prevention, earlier diagnosis and more, better and more personalised treatments for different forms of cancer.

The main cause for the growing number of new cancer cases in Norway is that both the population and the proportion of elderly people in the population are growing. The risk of cancer increases with advancing age. Three in four newly diagnosed cancer patients are women and men over 60 years of age. The number of new cases will continue to rise in the years ahead. By 2040, there will be more than 50,000 new cases a year. This will require us to ensure that the high quality of Norwegian cancer care is further improved.

Lack of personnel is a major challenge for health and care services in general. The growing demand for personnel will affect the municipal health and care services the most. Demographic trends mean that we will have to find new solutions to ensure an adequate supply of qualified personnel for our public health and care services. These solutions must be found in collaboration with patient organisations, scientists, business and industry and, not least, the services’ employees themselves.

The Government is now launching a new national cancer strategy that outlines its ambitions for cancer prevention and care for many years to come. The new ten-year strategy builds on the five focus areas from the current cancer strategy Living with Cancer 2017–2022. The cancer strategy sets out guidelines for the public administration, health and care services and other sectors that could have a bearing on attainment of the strategy’s goals.

The cancer strategy Joint efforts against cancer 2025–2035 contains five focus areas:

1. Norway will be a leading country in cancer prevention and early detection
2. Norway will be a leading country in providing good patient pathways
3. More user-centred cancer care
4. More people will survive and live longer with and after cancer
5. The best possible quality of life for cancer patients and their next of kin

These focus areas reflect the priorities set out in the EU’s Beating Cancer Plan, and we wanted to further specify them into what I have chosen to call ten-year goals. These areas will be particularly important to progress in cancer prevention and care, help to ensure that fewer people develop cancer and help cancer patients to survive and live longer with the best possible quality of life.

The Government wanted to structure its strategy in this way so that ten years from now, we will be able to measure whether we have succeeded in achieving the desired results. A lot of important work taking place on cancer has been mentioned in previous cancer strategies and will be developed further, even if it is not explicitly mentioned in the present strategy. This strategy focuses on the new initiatives to be launched over the coming decade.

Through joint efforts, we will contribute to giving cancer patients the best possible life and ensure that the good quality of Norwegian cancer care is further improved.

National cancer strategy 2025–2035