The IAEA works to increase the availability of, access to and quality of radiotherapy in its Member States. In response to Member State concerns regarding the rising incidence of cancer in the region, the IAEA launched a technical cooperation (TC) project at the beginning of 2016 to strengthen diagnostic and treatment capacities in the Latin American and the Caribbean region. Already, as a first step in establishing a base-line for planning purposes, the project coordinators have collected information on the human and infrastructure resources currently available in their countries. In March this year, a project coordination meeting took place in IAEA headquarters in Vienna, aiming to identify unexpected challenges and to explore future opportunities.
The meeting, which brought together 17 national representatives from 18 Member States in the region, namely Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvadore, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Spain and Uruguay was opened by Mr. Luis Longoria, Director of the Division for Latin America and the Caribbean, who stressed the need to strengthen capacities in cancer diagnosis and treatment. Participants attended presentations that covered a broad spectrum of subjects, from the success of past projects in the field of radiation therapy to the resources available in the IAEA's Human Health Campus, an e-learning tool.