Cancer rate to rise by 60% in next 2 decades
Driven by persistently high rates of HPV, hepatitis and smoking - especially in low-income countries - the world could see 60 percent more cancer cases in the next 20 years, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned in a new report.
Over 80 percent of these are expected to be diagnosed in low-income countries, according to the report released on Monday.
In the US, progress against cancer has been astounding as falling rates of smoking and better treatments for even though hardest-to-beat forms of the disease improve survival odds.
Other nations are not so fortunate and have had to invest their limited resources in fighting infectious diseases and keeping mothers and babies alive through pregnancy and infancy.
But internationally, the WHO says that seven million lives could be saved by improving screening and vaccination for HPV and hepatitis which lead to most cases of cervical cancer and liver cancer, respectively.
Worldwide - and in the US - cancer is the second leading cause of death.
Between 2016 and 2017, the US saw an all-time record drop of 2.2 fewer deaths percent in a single year.
It came as smoking rates continued to drop to record lows year-over-year.
But the American Cancer Society attributed the lives saved not just to prevention but to innovations and improvements in the screening and treatment of two of the most common forms of the disease: skin and lung cancers.
Other wealthy nations have seen similarly encouraging declines.
Poorer nations, on the other hand, don't have access to these same benefits.
According to a new WHO report, so long as current trends persist, the world is in for steep increases in cancers and cancer mortality.
Some 90 percent of wealthy nations provide a full pipeline of cancer care - from screening to diagnostics, treatment and palliative care - available through public health care systems.
But this is only the case in about 15 percent of poorer countries.
'This is a wake-up call to all of us to tackle the unacceptable inequalities between cancer services in rich and poor countries,' says Dr Ren Minghui, Assistant Director-General, Universal Health Coverage/Communicable and Noncommunicable Diseases at the WHO.
'If people have access to primary care and referral systems then cancer can be detected early, treated effectively and cured.
'Cancer should not be a death sentence for anyone, anywhere.'
In the US, children enrolled in public school are required to have vaccines against hepatitis A and B (unless, in some states, they have been granted medical or other exemption).
And the more recently introduced HPV vaccine is now recommended started at age 11, in an effort to prevent cancers caused by the sexually transmitted virus, which include most cervical cancers and some of the genitalia, head and neck.
Such measures require investment but are not unattainable, the WHO argues.
'The past 50 years have seen tremendous advances in research on cancer prevention and treatment,' says Dr Elisabete Weiderpass, Director of International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).
'Deaths from cancer have been reduced.
'High-income countries have adopted prevention, early diagnosis and screening programs, which together with better treatment, have contributed to an estimated 20percent reduction in the probability of premature mortality between 2000 and 2015, but low-income countries only saw a reduction of 5%. We need to see everyone benefiting equally.
Source: Daily Mail, UK
