Further to METUP member Mary Huckle’s appearance on Lorraine yesterday, she was featured in the Daily Mail, which has a daily readership of 2.2 million.
Mary Huckle, 54, from London, has metastatic secondary stage four breast cancer and was forced to completed stop chemotherapy at the beginning of lockdown after contracting Covid-19.
The personal trainer explained on Lorraine this morning that she isn’t in a ‘good situation’ after having her ‘lifeline’ taken away, and is ‘devastated’ for other patients who may have had their treatment stopped despite not contracting the virus.
Mary said, after her treatment was paused as she dealt with COVID
‘Subsequently I had to change treatment, so I’m on another IV chemotherapy at the moment it’s not good, not a good situation. I’m just hoping the one I’m on continues to work for me.’
There are not an unlimited number of treatment options available to secondary breast cancer patients, so running through another ‘treatment line’ is not to be done lightly (as well as having to adjust to new side effects). Thankfully, Mary receives private treatment, rather than NHS treatment, which gives her more options to move backwards and forwards through different treatments. For others on who only have access to the NHS, METUPUK continues to campaign for fair and equitable access to treatments around NICE guidelines.