Date: 6^th January, 2018

Speaker: Dr. Utpal Sanyal and Prof. Antony Gomes

Cancer is posing a serious problem globally as there are ~ 1 crore 40 lakh new incidences and 82 lakh deaths (1 death in every 3.8 sec) annually. Respective figures for India are ~ 10 lakh new incidences and 6.8 lakh deaths (1 death in every 46 sec).

Tobacco habit is firmly linked with cancer. In India 45% of all cancers are tobacco-related since prevalence of tobacco use is very high here. Each year 10 lakh Indians die (1 death in every 31 sec) due to tobacco related diseases including cancer. Globally Lung cancer is the most common cancer in terms of both incidences (>18.25 lakh new cases) and mortality (~16 lakh deaths). It is the commonest cancer among males and is directly linked with smoking (85-90% of all cases occur among smokers). Among the metros, highest number of lung cancer incidences is reported in Kolkata. Tobacco habit is responsible for over 55 lakh deaths (1 death in every 5.5 sec) at present globally. It appears that by 2020s, cancer and tobacco will both kill over 1 crore people globally. Hence proper awareness about cancer & tobacco is very essential.

Early detection is very helpful to fight cancer. One should always remember ‘CAUTION’ as the universally accepted 7 Danger signals that have been formed by taking the first letter of seven phrases. Based on ‘CAUTION’ we have developed 2 equivalent unique word phrases ‘SABDHANATA SWAGATA’ in Bengali and ‘KHATARNAK NISAN’ in Hindi that will be discussed in details. To describe various aspects of cancer, in our novel approach we have included in our presentation anti-cancer, anti-tobacco & other stamps along with relevant write-ups, tables, graphs and pictures taken from real life. This was published by us as a full paper for the first time in the world [U. Sanyal. Stamping out Cancer. Br. J. Cancer, 89, 2165-2171, 2003]. In our deliberation, we will specially cover the preventive measures that one should take in respect of habit, diet, life style etc. since it has been estimated that about 1/3^rd of all cancers are largely preventable.

Further in our fight against Tobacco, the silent killer, various aspects of health hazards associated with it will be discussed with special emphasis on how to kick the habit.