Incidence and Trends in Cancer -Indian Scenario

Dr. T. SujitConsultant Radiation Oncologist- High Precision Radiation TherapyComprehensive Cancer Care Network ( C C C N ) www.cccn.org.in

Age of incidence : young adults

Life-style related cancers : tobacco and alcohol dietphysical inactivity altered bio-rhythms

Prevention, screening and diagnosis :

• Vaccines

• Pap smears & mammograms

• Advanced imaging

Vastly improved treatment methods and protocols –

• Evidence based medicine

• Teamwork

• Chemotherapy

• Surgery

• Radiation Therapy

• Palliative care.

• Allied Specialities

• Socio-political measures : anti-smoking laws, ban on tobacco products

• NGOs and support groups

• Information dissemination and creation of awareness.

India is home to 10% of the world’s smokers

2nd largest consumer of tobacco

India has 12 crore tobacco users, according to the Global Adult

Tobacco Survey (GATS) 2009-2010, which means every ninth

Indian consumes tobacco.

Cigarette and bidi smoking causes about 5% of all deaths in

women and 20% of all deaths in men aged 30–69

years, totalling 1 million deaths per year in India in 2010.

WHO estimates passive

smoking causes 600,000

deaths every year.

One-third of those killed

are children who are

often exposed to smoke

at home

The total economic cost of tobacco use in India

in 2004 was calculated to be 16 per cent more

than the total excise tax revenues from all

tobacco products during the year.

Even the conservative estimates presented here are huge in comparison with

the taxes collected from tobacco or the expenditure on tobacco control

incurred by Government of India.

The mortality cost has been estimated to account for 84% of total tobacco-

related costs in India. Studies from China, Korea, USA, and Germany

estimate the cost of premature death to be 58%, 91%, 46% and 64% of the

total cost of smoking respectively.

If the value of tobacco-attributable deaths adds 84% to the total costs, our

estimate of the total economic costs of tobacco use in India for 2004 would

be $10.6 billion ( = 55,120 crores )

. . . AND THIS WAS IN 2009 !

( THE UNION BUDGET OUTLAY FOR HEALTHCARE IN 2009-10 : 22,300 CRORES )

Ban on Gutkha

Pongalipaka, a tiny village near

Vishakapatnam in Andhra Pradesh

with a population of 1,632 people has been

declared TOBACCO FREE since May 2012.