In 2005, the World Health Organisation issued a report on the relationship between chronic disease and poverty and the impact of these diseases on the economy. The report set a goal: how to reduce mortality rates for chronic diseases by 2015.
Topping the list of chronic illnesses are heart disease, cancer, respiratory problems, diabetes, and high blood pressure.
Among 58 million deaths globally in 2005, 35 million people died of chronic diseases. Of these, cancer came second to heart problems. The report indicated that 36 per cent of mortality cases—most of which have to do with cancer and heart diseases—could be averted by 2015, particularly in poorer countries.
Vulnerable poor
So why do people in these countries suffer so much more? The report indicates that the poor and needy are more vulnerable to chronic diseases as a result of living conditions, inadequate financial resources and poor sanitation and health facilities. The underprivileged are more prone to complications than the rich. The situation becomes worse when the patient is a woman, especially given the injustices women often suffer from.
Among the diseases with highest mortality are breast and lung cancer. Increased smoking rates in the Third World have augmented death from respiratory diseases. Statistics show that the poor consume more tobacco products and more high-fat foods than the well-off, and are hence more prone to obesity.
Relentless effort
The WHO Regional Office recently organised a seminar on “Cancer Prevention and Combating Tobacco”. The main speaker was World Health Organisation Goodwill Ambassador Nancy Brinker, who has been relentless in her efforts to encourage breast cancer awareness and prevention since her sister’s death from the disease three decades ago.
“Cancer is among the most fatal diseases today. In 2007 eight million people died of cancer, and the number is expected to rise to 21 million in 2030,” Ambassador Brinker said.
Cancer refers to the group of diseases characterised by unlimited proliferation of abnormal cells such that the body becomes helpless to control them. Cancer, also termed tumours, infects different parts of the body.
Ambassador Brinker said that in light of the threat posed by cancer, the latest meeting of the WHO Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean in Morocco announced a strategy for combating cancer, which kills 272,000 people annually in the region’s 22 countries, including Egypt. It is expected that cases of cancer will rise by 100 to 180 per cent over the coming 15 years. According to Ambassador Brinker, the new strategy is based on six elements: prevention, early discovery of disease, treatment, pain killing, reporting, and research.
Not in public
Film star Yusra called for a tobacco-free cinema experience. She said it was sad to see that most of the Ramadan TV series showed actors smoking, despite the relationship between smoking and lung cancer. She told the conference she could never forget a dear aunt who had died of lung cancer even though she has never been a smoker. Smokers, she said, were even more vulnerable to lung cancer.
For his part Mahmoud Qabil, the well-loved actor and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, admitted that one of his two sons smoked and that he was trying hard to persuade him to quit smoking. Which reminded him, he said, that President Obama had pledged to stop smoking. Upon which he turned to Ambassador Brinker and asked whether President Obama had indeed managed to stop smoking. She replied that she was not sure, but she knew the president was doing his utmost to stop the habit and said he never smoked in public.