There is only one consultant oncologist for every 900 cancer patients in Cork and Kerry, it has emerged.
The figure was revealed at a meeting in Kerry to mark the launch of a campaign to have BreastCheck extended to the county, and for an improvement in cancer care services for women in the region.
The meeting, organised by the Labour Party, was told there was a major deficit in cancer services in the region, with one of the most eminent consultants in the country resigning because of lack of resources at Cork University Hospital.
"This is not a political party issue. It is a people's issue," said Noel O'Connor, spokesman for the Kerry Breast Action Group.
Almost 2,000 cases of breast cancer are diagnosed in Ireland each year and more than 70 of these are in Kerry.
In the east of the country women aged between 50 and 64 - the group most susceptible to breast cancer - are invited to a clinic for a free mammogram through the BreastCheck scheme.
Former health minister Micheál Martin had promised a nationwide BreastCheck service for 2002, and then it was to be 2005. But it is still not in place, the Labour Party health spokeswoman, Deputy Liz McManus, told the meeting. She said twelve counties - Donegal, Sligo, Leitrim, Roscommon, Mayo, Galway, Clare, Tipperary, Waterford, Cork, Limerick and Kerry - were still excluded.
Over 90 per cent of women who were offered appointments took them up, and the evidence was that mammograms every two years reduced breast cancer deaths by up to 30 per cent.
If the service were rolled out to Kerry, 10,000 women would be immediately eligible for free screening, said Ms McManus.
Labour Tfor Kerry South, Breeda Moynihan-Cronin, said Dr Oscar Breathnach, the consultant oncologist at Cork University Hospital, had resigned because of the lack of resources.
"That a medical professional of the esteem and high standard of Dr Breathnach has to resign to highlight the chronic shortage of resources available to him is a testament to the major deficit in the resourcing of cancer services in the regions," she said.
Speaking in Kerry last night where she was addressing the IMO annual conference, Minister for Health Mary Harney said it was clear that a proper service could not be provided with just one oncologist for every 900 patients. She said an oncologist post would be filled shortly at Cork University Hospital, and she also promised a full roll-out of BreastCheck by 2007.