Cancer Deaths in India Expected to Reach 7 Lakh by 2015

Bangalore: Cancer is a corrosive threat to the society which has caused millions of deaths and continues to nab people in its vicious cycle each year. Cancer is a major public health concern which has become one of the ten leading causes of death in India. Each year one million cancer cases get added to the existing list. It is estimated that there are about 3 million cases of cancer at any given point of time, as reported by Financial Express.

The professor and surgeon at Tata Memorial Hospital, Dr Pankaj Chaturvedi said that annually as many as 5 lakh deaths occur due to cancer in India. According to the WHO Report 2005, the estimated deaths by cancer in India are projected to rise to 7 lakh by 2015. The burden of cancer is expected to increase further due to the increase in life expectancy, demographic transitions and the effects of tobacco and other risk factors, informed Chaturvedi.

It was reported that forty percent of the cancer cases are because of tobacco usage. The leading cancer sites are oral cavity, oesophagus, lungs and stomach in men and breast, cervix and oral cavity in women. When calculated cancer accounts for maximum deaths in the world than AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria combined.

Cancer is considered as one of the three greatest risks to the global economy due to escalating cost of care, the threat to productivity from death and disability and the effects of costs on household impoverishment by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

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