Prague, Feb 3 (CTK) – The costs of the cancer patients treatment rose by 20 percent in the past five years, reaching about 20 billion crowns in 2017, it ensues from health insurers’ information released to CTK.
The country’s three health insurance companies, whose clients make up 80 percent of the Czech population, paid 18.74 billion crowns for the treatment of 369,000 oncological patients last year, they told CTK.
The costs have been rising steeper than the number of patients due to the rising prices of medicines.
The largest insurer, the General Health Insurance Company (VZP), paid 14.4 billion crowns for 309,000 oncological patients last year, compared to 12.2 billion crowns for 291,000 patients in 2013, its spokesman told CTK.
The spending of the other two large insurers’, which are the Interior Ministry’s insurance company and the CPZP company, have also considerably increased in the past five years.
They expect the costs to further increase in 2018.
The insurers say the treatment of the tumours of the digestive tract, breast, male sex organs and the urinary system is the most expensive.
Non-malignant skin cancer is the most frequent type, they say.
In the 10.5-million Czech Republic, cancer is the second most frequent cause of death, after cardiovascular diseases.
In 2016, tumours caused about 27 percent of all deaths, with lung tumour death rate being the highest of all.
According to the Health Information and Statistics Institute, about 94,500 new cancer patients were diagnosed in 2015, a 2-percent year-on-year increase for male patients and 3-percent for women.
Most types of tumours afflict men more often than women, with the exception of thyroid cancer.
The new patients are most often people aged over 65, who make up two thirds of new male and 58 percent of new female patients.
