New Delhi: Over 1.3 million lives are lost every year to various types of cancers caused by smoking tobacco across seven countries, including India, according to a study published in The Lancet’s clinical medicine journal. Researchers found that together, the seven countries – India, China, the UK, Brazil, Russia, the US and South Africa represented more than half of the global burden of cancer deaths every year.
They noted that smoking, as well as three other preventable risk factors – alcohol, obesity, and human papillomavirus (HPV) infections — caused almost two million deaths combined, according to a PTI report.
The study, carried out by researchers from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and Kings College London, UK, also analysed the years of life lost to cancer.
The researchers concluded that the four preventable risk factors resulted in over 30 million years of life lost each year. Smoking tobacco had by far the biggest impact – leading to 20.8 million years of life being lost.
“Seeing how many years of life are lost to cancer due to these risk factors in countries around the world allows us to see what certain countries are doing well, and what isn’t working,” said Judith Offman, Senior Lecturer at Queen Mary University of London.
“Globally, someone dies every two minutes from cervical cancer. (Around) 90 per cent of these deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries and could be cut drastically with comprehensive screening and HPV vaccination programmes,” said Offman, who worked on the study while at King’s College London.
The researchers made the findings by collecting population-attributable fractions of the four risk factors from previous global studies and applied these to estimates of cancer deaths during 2020. Preventable risk factors were associated with different cancer types in different places, they said.
In India…..
“We know that HPV vaccination prevents cervical cancer. This, coupled with cervical screening, could eliminate cervical cancer as a public health problem. Countries need to come together on this ambition,” Offman added.
Dubai: A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and the country’s Foreign Minister crashed on…
Bhubaneswar: BJP's MP candidate for Bhubaneswar Aparajita Sarangi came down heavily on BJD leader VK…
By Kanishka Puri Rajani Panchang, who completed her BSc and MSc in Geology from Pune…
Bhubaneswar: The BJD on Sunday accused the BJP of resorting to derogatory remarks against chief…
Mumbai: Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has been a permanent fixture at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival…
Balangir: Will Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's decision to contest from Kantabanji, in addition to his…
Bhubaneswar: Election related violence erupted again in Odisha's Ganjam district as a group of BJP…
Lucknow: Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav had to leave a joint election rally in UP’s…