Recent Advancement in Cancer and its Prevention

Cancer is emerging as major public health problem in India and it is lifestyle related, have a long latent period and needs specialized infrastructure and human resource for treatment. Based on the cancer registry data it is estimated about 800,000 new cancers cases in India every year. Cancer sites associated with tobacco form 35-50% of all cancers in men and about 17% of cancers in women. These cancers are amenable to primary prevention and can be controlled to a large extent. Cancer can occur in all living cells in the body and different cancer types have different natural history. Epidemiological studies have shown that 70-90% of all cancers are environmental. Lifestyle related factors are the most important and preventable among the environmental exposures. Tobacco consumption either as chewing or smoking will account for 50% of all cancers in men. Dietary practices, reproductive and sexual practices etc will account for 20-30% of cancers. Appropriate changes in lifestyle and recent advancement to detect cancer at early stage can help to decide the therapeutic regime which can reduce the mortality and morbidity from a good proportion of cancer.