Simeon Brown

But the reality is when people are diagnosed with cancer, we need to make sure that they receive the treatments that they need in a timely manner, and we need to provide those treatments closer to home.

And that's what this rollout delivers.

Look, there's always demand in our health system for further expenditure.

I think for most New Zealanders, though, they would say cancer is right at the top of the list.

Cancer is one of those top priorities.

Everyone knows someone who's been affected by cancer or had cancer themselves and making sure that we're providing those modern medicines closer to home.

is a top priority that we're focused on delivering.

And that's why we invested the additional money in Pharmac back in Budget 24.

It's why we're investing in the rollout of additional cancer infusion centres closer to home.

And particularly, I think, you know, travel is a big thing for people with cancer.

They have to travel often for their infusions.

Delivering these services like, you know, the Waitakere Infusion Centre at Waitakere Hospital is going to make a massive difference for patients.

And for many patients, that's going to be

life-changing and actually mean they can start their treatment sooner and have a much better response to their treatment.

I think we're still guessing to a degree, but given that everyone is starting to move that bit closer, I mean, at Infometrics, we're also picking three hikes this year.

Yes, there's uncertainty, but I guess we were all becoming more uncomfortable.

And this is true for the Reserve Bank, too.

As we're looking back at the last time we had sort of a shock to the system like this,

What do we do?

We left it too long.