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MARCH 26, 2026
Screening: ‘we’re working on it’ By Viv Posselt
Health Minister Simeon Brown has apologised to prostate cancer sufferers for being unable to fully answer their questions or offer promises around improved diagnosis and treatment of the disease. Brown conceded that New Zealand lagged behind many other countries in the early detection and treatment pathways offered, but said he was active in lobbying for changes to be made. He was speaking at a Cambridge Primary School meeting hosted by the Cambridge Prostate Cancer Support Group last week Also present were Hamilton-based urologist
Shiva Nair, Auckland-based Prostate Cancer Foundation chief executive Peter Dickens and Taupō MP Louise Upston. With around 4000 new cases and about 700 deaths annually, prostate cancer is one of the most common cancers to affect men in this country. The Prostate Cancer Foundation and other groups have lobbied successive governments to introduce a pilot prostate cancer screening programme along similar lines to screening programmes offered for breast, cervical and bowel cancers. Brown said there was a real need to increase screening opportunities for prostate cancer. Challenges
included limited access to MRI facilities and skills shortages in that area. “Both are needed to enable us to roll out national screening trials. I am sorry I don’t have answers or promises I can give you at this stage, but I want to encourage you by assuring you we are working on it.” Brown said some of the work being done on his five key Health New Zealand priorities were positively impacting patients generally, and were starting to achieve targets. However, waiting lists for MRI screening across the country remained too long, and this was one of the key challenges linked to the introduction of a national screening programme for prostate cancer.
He said work being done by the Prostate Cancer Foundation, and volunteers for organisations such as the Cambridge Prostate Cancer Support Group,
was important in spreading the message about prostate health. “The health care system deals with what happens at hospital level, but it
is often the work done by the foundation and organisations such as yours that plays such a critical role, and that the government can’t often do,” he said.
An iron maiden
School decision backed By Mary Anne Gill
Data - not politics or broken promises was behind the decision to pause plans for a new primary school in Cambridge West, Waipā mayor Mike Pettit says. The former principal of Cambridge Primary School says current enrolment numbers show there is no immediate need for another school, even though population growth in the town continues and land has long been set aside for the project. Pettit was responding to confirmation from the Ministry of Education that it will not proceed with the planned Cambridge West Primary School “right now”, leaving the designated site empty, despite infrastructure already being in place.
“Right now, there is capacity in some schools within the town belt. There is capacity on both sides of the bridge,” Pettit said. “Five or six years ago there was a desperate need across this town. Schools were beyond full - our school was a good example of that. But the demographic has changed. There are fewer primary-aged children and there is capacity in some of our schools now.” Waikato director of education Marcus Freke expects a school will be needed in the future, based on development allowed under the District Plan, and has retained the site while monitoring subdivision consents and school rolls.
Continued on page 2
Cambridge’s 2026 Autum festival wrapped up with a community event in central Cambridge last weekend – and among those keeping watch was the owner of the Hamilton-based Free Lunch Theatre Company Sandra Jensen. Inside today we publish the winning tale in the festival’s short story competition and meet the author. See pages 2 and 10
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