Alarm raised over rising cancer cases in Marsabit

Leaders from Marsabit have warned that cancer could wipe out the community.

They have raised the red flag over the rising cases in the county and called for swift intervention to arrest the situation. They spoke on Thursday during Desertification and Drought Day celebrations at Korolle Oasis in the Chalbi desert.

“Cancer has been spreading and is now affecting many people. The government must take responsibility as it brought oil explorers here,” Senator Godana Hargura said, adding the government should compensate residents for its lapse.

He also called for the need to construct a hospital for early detection of the disease. The sentiments were echoed by Leisamis MP Malimo Arbelle, who said cancer has affected the community for the past 30 years.

"Many people are affected by throat and stomach cancer. Oil exploration in the 1980s could be the cause," he said.

Arbelle said they will not rest until the affected community gets redress.

Also present at the function were North Horr MP Chachu Ganya, Nema Board chairman John Konchellah, Kenya Water Towers Agency Board chairman Joseph Malombe, National Environment Management Authority director general Mamo Mamo, National Environment Trust Fund CEO Samson Toniok, Kenya Forestry Research Institute director Joshua Cheboiwo and World Wide Fund for Nature-Kenya CEO Mohamed Awer.

Kargi-South Horr MCA Assunta Galgidele urged Nema to test water being used by residents.

"The national and county governments must construct a mega-dam so that treated water serves locals," she said.

Kargi chief Arbele Mohammed said the location alone has more than 300 cases against a population of about 7,000 people. It has been adversely hit, he said.

"Eighty per cent of people living with cancer are women. I do not know the reason," Mohammed said, expressing concern that residents go for screening when the disease is at an advanced stage.

Sabina Larabi, a community health assistant at Kargi health facility, said the situation is worsening by the day.

"Some of the affected locals use herbs and when the situation worsens, they come to seek assistance when it is too late," she said.

Cancer is the second leading cause of death among non-communicable diseases, and the number of cases is rising rapidly.

The annual incidence in Kenya is about 28,000 cases, with an annual mortality of 22,000 cases, meaning 78.5 per cent of the victims do not survive.

Cancer is also said to be the third-leading cause of death in Kenya, after infectious and cardiovascular diseases. In 2005, cancer deaths were about 18,000 people, and by 2014, they were about 22 000. 

The disease affects Kenyans of all ages and socio-economic backgrounds but has a disproportionate impact on the most vulnerable groups.

Cervical cancer makes up the largest portion of cancer cases (nearly 12 per cent), followed by breast cancer, Kaposi’s sarcoma, oesophageal and prostate cancer.  

In 2020, according to the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer, new cases of all types of cancers increased to nearly 20 million worldwide, and there were 10 million deaths (up from about 17 million and 9.5 million respectively in 2018).

Projections suggest that one in five people worldwide will develop cancer during their lifetime and that the global cancer burden is projected to rise by about 50 per cent over the next 20 years.

The growing burden is driven by aging populations, as well as several risk factors, such as sedentary lifestyles, obesity and smoking.

Most cases in the country are diagnosed at an advanced stage, when treatment options are limited and families make huge sacrifices, often with poor results. 

In 2020, the Marsabit community petitioned the High Court, through Kituo Cha Sheria, to compel the government to intervene quickly to avert further spread of the scourge to save the lives of both people and livestock.

It is the first time in Kenya that a community is suing the state to have it compelled to provide a clean and healthy environment—a constitutional right.

The matter was filed before the deputy registrar of the Constitutional and Human Rights Division at the High Court in Nairobi by senior counsel John Khaminwa and Kituo Cha Sheria lawyer John Mwariri and Valarie Ang’awa.

In this case, the petitioners are compelling the government to ensure they have access to clean and safe water.

The underground water used by the pastoralist communities in the desert has been found to contain toxins.

Residents claim the poisonous substances were dumped in the desert by multinational corporations.

They said Amoco Petroleum, which explored oil in the 1980s and abandoned the project, after drilling oil wells in Kargi and Dukana locations, did not properly decommission the wells.

Residents claim the chemicals used by explorers in their activities were neither destroyed nor buried. They include toxic chemicals, general equipment and scrap metal.

The poisonous material was left on the ground and is suspected to be the cause of the numerous cancer deaths among residents. Livestock is also affected.

Other areas affected include Dukana, Bubisa, Maikona, Kalacha and Noth Horr—all in the northern part of the desert. The disease has also spread to other parts of the county.

The petitioners are also blaming a cache of carcinogenic, hazardous waste they say was dumped in the desert around Kargi location in the 1980s by global companies.

To support their assertion, they cite a report in 2010 by Greenpeace, an environmental non-governmental organisation based in the Netherlands.

In the report, the NGO revealed that nearly 10 million tonnes of toxic waste from Europe were shipped to Africa between 1988 and 1994.

One of the key destinations for this cancer-causing waste, the report said, was the Somalia coast.

The petitioners, however, say the Greenpeace report is supported by Legambiente, an Italy-based environmental association that started out as an anti-nuclear campaigner.

It confirmed that “vessels were sent to Somalia and other developing countries such as Kenya and Zaire (DR Congo) with toxic cargoes.”

The nuclear waste is believed to have been buried in the Chalbi desert and other barren areas of northeastern Kenya.

Speculation about the dumping of nuclear waste has been rife in Kenya, and the issue was first raised in Parliament in the 1990s following complaints about incidents of strange deaths in Marsabit and in northeastern counties.

The government has always denied the claims, but in 2009 the Ministry of Environment investigated the cause of the deaths of people and livestock in Kargi location, assisted by other ministries and government agencies.

In a report, Persistent Water Poisoning in Marsabit District, the government notes that Western multinationals are known to have dumped hazardous waste in third world countries. It goes further to say that allegations that such waste might have been discarded in Kenya should not be dismissed.

Residents of Kargi witnessed the dumping of toxic waste. It took place at the same time as the oil exploration by Amoco Petroleum. 

One of the most memorable is the deaths of 7,000 livestock—cattle, sheep and goats—in January 2000. The animals had consumed water from a borehole in Kargi.

Near the borehole, a deep hole, residents say, had been drilled by unknown foreigners and several white substances buried and covered.

Earlier in the 1990s, a similar incident had taken place in Balesa, near Dukana in northern Chalbi, when a flock of sheep and goats died after consuming water from a borehole drilled next to an abandoned oil well.

The well was drilled by Amoco Kenya Petroleum Company.

After the livestock deaths, several cancer cases were detected among residents of Chalbi desert—a majority of them from Kargi, Bubisa, Maikona, Kalacha and North Horr.

Death became so common in these areas that people stopped seeking medical treatment after being diagnosed with cancer.