Catherine Lam

Abstract

Global childhood cancer survival rates show a stark contrast between high-income countries, where survival rates are as high as 80%, and low-income and middle-income countries, where they are about 20%. For more than two decades, St Jude Children's Research Hospital (Memphis, TN, USA) has been working to tackle this imbalance. In March, 2018, St Jude became the first WHO Collaborating Centre for Childhood Cancer, with the ambitious aim of curing at least 60% of children with six common types of cancer by 2030. Co-director of the WHO Collaborating Centre is Catherine Lam, a St Jude paediatric oncologist and Director of the Health Systems Unit and of the Asia-Pacific Regional Program at St Jude Global. “There are still lots of disparities within countries and across countries that we are tackling”, Lam says. She hopes that the WHO collaboration will draw the attention of policy makers and donors so that they will dedicate sustainable resources to the challenges.