Dr Luis Gomez Sambo, World Health Organisation’s Regional Director for Africa has said that cancer represents a major public health problem in Africa.

According to him, cancer is a serious, non-communicable and potentially preventable disease. He added that in 2002, the number of few cases of cancer per-year was estimated at 582,000 and deaths rose up to 412,000.

Speaking on the commemoration of World Cancer Day yesterday, Dr. Sambo called for immediate efforts to embark on a crusade against the disease saying “If no cancer control intervention is scaled up, by 2020, there will be about one million new cases of cancer, more than half of whom will die. By the same date, globally, the number of deaths due to smoking will reach 10 million per year, 70% of which will be in developing countries” he said.

According to Dr Sambo, smoking is one of the major risk factors of cancer saying that currently, a clear relationship between smoking and increase in mortality was established as for back as the 1960’s.

“The toxic effects of Tabacco are well known and many epidemilological studies have highlighted the harmful consequences of such intoxication on the respiratory and cardiovascular status of people and the occurrence of many forms of cancer. Smoking causes cancer in all parts of the human body, particularly in the lung, mouth, bladder, kidney and uterine cervix” he said.

Dr. Sambo added that in Africa, in the year 2000, the prevelance of smoking was 295 among men and 7% among women, and there were 200,000 smoking related deaths. He noted that young people are increasingly affected as shown by the Global Youth tobacco Survey conducted by WHO and the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP). He said in Africa, 44% of children between the age of 13 to 15 years are exposed to second hand tobacco smoke at home, and 56% in public places.

He however, outlined that nearly half of the world’s children, which is about 700 million, breath air polluted with tobacco smoke, especially at home saying that second hand smoking poses a greater danger to the health of the people.

Our duty therefore, he emphasised, should be to ensure that African children grow in a smoke free world as today’s children are tomorrow’s world and are asking for a free start. “Let us apply ourselves to this duty and we will win the battle against cancer” he concluded.