ISLAMABAD – President Asif Ali Zardari has approved the National Institute of Health (Reorganization) Amendment Bill 2025, which paves the way for the creation of a National Cancer Registry aimed at understanding the true burden of cancer in Pakistan and developing a comprehensive national prevention strategy.
The bill, passed by the National Assembly on August 12, 2025, seeks to restructure the NIH and improve its governance and performance. According to the Presidency’s press wing, the legislation is a significant step toward healthcare reform and institutional improvement.
Under the new law, the NIH will establish a centralized database of cancer cases to accurately record statistics including confirmed cases, cancer-related deaths, recoveries, hospital-based pending cases, and demographic details such as age, gender, and location.
The registry will help identify national trends and enable effective planning and policy-making. It will also ensure that patients’ personal data remains confidential, requiring written consent for any data to be shared with unauthorized parties.
The bill highlights the growing global cancer burden and stresses that Pakistan’s current data significantly underrepresents the real extent of the disease. For instance, the Global Cancer Observatory reported 178,388 cancer cases in Pakistan in 2020, based on data from the Punjab Cancer Registry, which primarily covers Lahore and parts of central Punjab.
Considering Pakistan’s population of over 220 million, these figures fail to capture the national scale of the issue. Previous efforts to establish a national registry have been hampered by resource constraints.
The new legislation also outlines plans to raise awareness at the village and union council levels, while encouraging collaboration with public and private institutions working to combat cancer. The registry aims to support a National Action Plan for cancer prevention and control, based on accurate data and strategic planning.
