‘Year 2020 to see 7 million deaths due to tobacco’

ALLAHABAD: Allahabad Medical Association (AMA) organised a CME (continuous medical education) at AMA Hall on the occasion of World No Tobacco Day 2015 on Sunday to highlight the ill effects of tobacco and treatment of tobacco related cancers.

Cancer specialist, Kamla Nehru Hospital, Dr Radha Rani Ghosh, spoke on the adverse effects of tobacco use. She discussed in detail the early investigations to detect cancer and timely management of it. Tobacco is the single largest cause of preventable death in humans today.

Every year, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and its partners mark World No Tobacco Day on May 31 highlighting the health risks associated with tobacco use and advocating effective policies to reduce its consumption. Countries are also called upon to work together to ‘end illicit trade of tobacco products’.

There are about 1.2 billion estimated tobacco users globally and the number will cross 1.6 billion by 2020. Globally, around 3.5 to 4 million deaths occur annually due to tobacco abuse. By the year 2020 an estimated 10 million deaths, of which 7 million alone will be reported in the developed countries due to tobacco abuse.

Greatest impact on mortality and morbidity is due to lung cancer, Ischemic heart disease, chronic obstructive airway disease; tobacco related head and neck cancers.

The type of cancer caused by tobacco abuse depends on the nature of tobacco use like, chewing tobacco causes oral cavity cancer and other oropharyngeal cancers, smoking causes lung, larynx, urinary bladder cancers. About 150 AMA members participated in the CME. Dr Manoj Mathur presented the vote of thanks and assured that AMA will hold CME’s to raise awareness among doctors and society regarding timely management of cancers. Padamshree Dr B Paul and Dr B K Mishra chaired the session. The CME was presided over by AMA president Dr Abhilasha Chaturvedi.