Infection causes one in six new cancer cases
Largely preventable or treatable infections with viruses, bacteria
and parasites cause about two million new cancer cases and 1.5 million
cancer deaths each year, said a study published yesterday.
This amounted to about one in six of the 12.7 million new cancer
cases reported in 2008, said the report in The Lancet Oncology journal.
"Application of existing public health methods for infection
prevention, such as vaccination, safer injection practice or
antimicrobial treatments, could have a substantial effect on the future
burden of cancer worldwide," said the report by the International Agency
for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France.
Four infections, hepatitis B and C, human papillomavirus (HPV) and
the Helicobacter pylori stomach bacteria, accounted for the bulk of the
cases, some 1.9 million -- mostly gastric, liver and cervical cancers.
Infection-related cancers accounted for 3.3 percent of new cases in
Australia and New Zealand, but 32.7 percent in sub-Saharan Africa, said
the report, based on a study of 27 cancer types in 184 countries.
Cervical cancer accounted for half the infection-related cancers in
women, and liver and gastric cancers for 80 percent of cases in men.
"Around 30 percent of infection-attributable cases occur in people
younger than 50 years," said the report. - AFP |