‘Number of patients with respiratory diseases on the rise’
Nadira Gunatilleke
The number of patients with respiratory diseases in Sri Lanka is on
the increase annually.
Around 4,000 new lung cancer patients are detected here annually
while the number of undetected patients is unknown.
Around 300 of them are women and the rest are male smokers. Most of
the affected females are victims of passive smoking, said Director of
Welisara Chest Hospital Dr. P.Wijesuriya at the Family Planning Bureau
Auditorium, Colombo recently.
“As a political leader who genuinely loves and cares for the people,
Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena had made a decision to make it
compulsory for cigarette manufacturers to display a pictorial warning on
cigarette packets on negative impacts of smoking. Many foreign countries
have already implemented this law.
“No one has an ethical right to hide the negative impact on health
caused by any product. Even doctors explain side effects of medications
to the patients while treating them,” he said. The team of doctors
pointed out that 90 percent of male lung cancer patients are smokers.
Only around 250 lung cancer patients (out of 4,000) can be operated and
15 percent of them have five year survival.
“Smokers can be affected by many other diseases, such as, diabetes,
stroke, high cholesterol and high blood pressure in addition to lung
cancer.
They have a very low immunity and take more time to recover from
operations, injuries etc. Smokers can also develop diseases, such as,
pneumonia can be easily developed in smokers.
“Smoking can cause impotency in males. In addition, smoking blocks
tiny veins in the face and make the skin dull and causes wrinkles.
Cigarettes contain 60 cancerous substances and thousands of other
chemicals.
“The temperature and the low quality of cigarettes available in
developing countries can also cause cancer, Leukemia etc,” he said. |