Latin America threatened with cancer epidemic
Baku, May 1 (AZERTAC). Latin America faces a cancer epidemic, scientists warned as they pressed for urgent action to reduce tobacco use and obesity and allocate more resources to control the disease.
The researchers spoke at the Latin American Cooperative Oncology Group (LACOG) 2013 conference at which they unveiled a groundbreaking study on soaring cancer cases in the region.
The study, published in the British journal The Lancet Oncology, points to around 13 deaths for every 22 cancer cases in the region, compared to around 13 deaths for every 37 cases in the United States and around 13 deaths for every 30 cases in Europe.
It estimated that by 2030, 1.7 million cases of cancer will be diagnosed in Latin America and the Caribbean, with more than one million deaths from cancer predicted to occur annually.
It said the main reason was that too many people are diagnosed with cancer at a late stage, when the disease is much harder to treat and more likely to kill.
"We want to galvanize everybody to take action. Cancer is going to be the number one threat and we believe it is very wise to invest more and distribute the budget and resources equitably across all the populations of a country," lead researcher Paul Goss of Harvard Medical School told a press conference.
The American scientist said that while many regional governments have cancer control plans, "what we find is that implementation is lacking."
"Too small a fraction of GDP is going to cancer control and too small a fraction of the overall health budget is directed to cancer control," he added.
Fellow researcher Eduardo Cazap, a member of the executive committee of Argentina`s National Cancer institute, noted that there were 1.2 million cancer cases in Latin America, or 10 percent of the world total.
Of these 1.2 million cases, 60 percent were in just two countries: Mexico and Brazil, the region`s economic engines, he added.
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