Cancer patients in fight to pay heating bills
by Katie Lamborn
Cancer patients in Kent are struggling to pay
their heating bills - according to a leading charity.
Sufferers are twice as likely to fall into
fuel poverty then other residents in the county.
Macmillan Cancer Support has found that
nationwide almost one in five cancer patients cannot afford to keep
their homes warm - double the official national UK figures for the
general public.
"[Cancer patients] may have lost their hair or
lost weight so they are feeling colder and have turned their
heating up to try and feel warm," says Jennifer Mitchell, a policy
analyst from Macmillan Cancer Support.
"Obviously that means their fuel bills have
gone up. Often at a time when people with cancer have found
that their income has been reduced because they have had to give up
work - so it's a double whammy."
Macmillan is calling on the Government to
offer cancer patients the winter fuel payment like they do the
elderly.
Aubrey Price, 73, from Rainham, finished his
radiotherapy treatment for prostate cancer in January of this
year.
Aubrey, who lives with his wife Valerie, said:
"When I was having my radiotherapy I had to have the heating on
more as I feel the cold so much more.
"Last winter during that heavy frost my
heating bill did shoot up and we only have a one-bedroom
bungalow. We get £200 a year from the government towards our
heating bills but it is still a worry. "
"Struggling with fuel bills is a situation
that can very quickly spiral out of control for cancer patients and
it is simply not fair," says Stephen Richards, Director for the
South East at Macmillian Cancer Support.
"They need help from the Government and they
need it now."
Tuesday, October 27 2009