Celebrity cancers discourage smoking

When a celebrity is diagnosed with a smoking-related cancer,imgres interest in quitting smoking among the general public increases, according to a new study.

Huffington Post reports that a ” team of researchers found that when Brazil President Lula da Silva was diagnosed in 2011 with laryngeal cancer, which he said was caused by smoking, online search activity regarding quitting smoking and media coverage on quitting smoking increased in the days after. Plus, this interest in smoking cessation remained higher than normal even a month after his diagnosis was announced.

“This study is the first to demonstrate that celebrity diagnoses can prompt the public to engage in behaviors that prevent cancer,” study researcher Seth M. Noar, a health communication professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said in a statement. “Harnessing this finding will save far more lives than screening alone.”

“Noar and his colleagues, from the Santa Fe Institute, San Diego State University and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, examined Google news archives to look at media coverage, and also analyzed Googled searches, in the weeks following the announcement of da Silva’s laryngeal cancer diagnosis in October 2011. They found that news coverage about quitting smoking rose 500 percent right after his diagnosis was announced, and stayed higher by 163 percent for the week following his diagnosis. During this time, Google searches for quitting smoking also were 67 percent higher than normal. Continue reading “Celebrity cancers discourage smoking”

Skin cancer more common in men

imagesCancer Research UK said each year, the most serious type of skin cancer, malignant melanoma, kills 1,300 men and 900 women, a gap expected to widen, reports the BBC.Far more men than women are dying from skin cancer, despite similar numbers being diagnosed with the disease, a report from European scientists suggests.

“A reason could be men delaying seeking help, but biology may also play a part. Prof Julia Newton-Bishop, a Cancer Research UK dermatologist, suspects women have stronger immune systems.German researchers have already identified a gene that appears to make men, but not women, more susceptible to melanoma. Prof Newton-Bishop, from the University of Leeds, said: “Research has suggested the difference between the sexes could be in part because men are more likely to be diagnosed when melanoma is at a more advanced stage.

“But there also seem to be strong biological reasons behind the differences, and we’re working on research to better understand why men and women’s bodies deal with their melanomas in different ways. “Stage for stage, men do less well with this cancer so there’s something very important that this is telling us about how the body deals it. “We think it is something to do with the immune system rather than hormones because pre- and post-menopausal fare the same.” Continue reading “Skin cancer more common in men”

Tattoos that hide melanoma

Millions of Americans head to the tattoo parlor to get “inked” each year, but a new study suggests that getting a tattoo over a mole or birthmark may not be healthy. As WebMD reports:images

“That’s because having a tattoo over a mole especially can make it difficult to detect the development of skin cancer, the researchers said. Reporting July 31 in the journal JAMA Dermatology, researchers in Germany pointed to the case of a young man who developed melanoma on a pre-existing colored skin lesion (mole or birthmark) within a tattoo during and between phases of laser tattoo removal. Sixteen other cases of melanoma developing within tattoos have been reported in English-language journals, the study authors said.

“In general, tattoos should never be placed on pigmented lesions; if they are, the tattoos should never be treated by laser,” said the researchers, who were led by Dr. Laura Pohl of Laserklinik Karlsruhe. Dermatologists in the United States concur that moles should be no-go areas for tattoos. “Fifty percent of all melanomas develop in pre-existing moles,” said Dr. Hooman Khorasani of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in New York City. “It is harder to do surveillance on moles that are covered by tattoos, as the tattoo ink camouflages the mole and sometimes interferes with some of the tools we use for detection.” Tattoo removal can make mole surveillance more difficult too, he said. Continue reading “Tattoos that hide melanoma”

HPV risks in men

It’s rare for men to contract an oral HPV infection, but single men and smokers face a relatively greater risk, a new study suggests, as reported on KFVS.

“The study, published online recently in The Lancet, followed more than 1,600 men to chart rates of oral infection with HPV, or human papillomavirus. HPV, which can cause genital and anal warts, is the most commonly transmitted sexual infection in the United States. Some strains of the virus can eventually lead to cancer. But it has not been fully clear how often HPV infects the mouth and throat. The answer, at least in healthy men, is not very often, based on the new findings. However, being single or being a smoker were risk factors for initial infection. Smokers had nearly three times the risk of a cancer-linked HPV infection, versus nonsmokers. Singles were about three to four times more likely to contract a cancer-linked infection than men who were married or living with someone. Overall, less than 2 percent of the study participants contracted an HPV strain linked to an increased cancer risk in one year. And for most men, the immune system cleared the virus within a year. Continue reading “HPV risks in men”

Bad habits cause more cancer in men

These days men die five years younger than women, typically expiring at 76  as women live to 81. For the longest time the leading reason was heart disease. But now things are changing. As todays’ Guarding reports:

“Men are 35% more likely to die

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from cancer than women, with men’s drinking and eating habits, late diagnosis and advances in breast cancer treatment cited for the stark differential.

An analysis of the most recent UK deaths from cancer found that 202 out of every 100,000 men died from cancer in 2010 compared with 147 per 100,000 women.

“When sex-specific forms of the disease are excluded, such as prostate, testicular and ovarian cancer, the gender gap is even wider, with men 67% more likely to die. And when only working age people are looked at men under 65 have a 58% greater chance of dying than women of the same age. The sexes’ respective likelihood of death varies depending on the type of cancer. Men are almost three times as likely as women to die of oesophageal cancer and almost twice as likely to die from liver cancer.

The figures come from a new report produced by Cancer Research UK (CRUK), the Men’s Health Forum (MHF) and the National Cancer Intelligence Network, called “Excess cancer burden in men”, which is published on Tuesday at an MHF conference. It has prompted calls for men to adopt healthier lifestyles and the NHS to do more to spot cancer in men earlier.

“There are a variety of potential explanations for the difference. “The reasons for the increased risk of cancer in men versus women are not completely understood but experts believe that lifestyle is important. Men are more likely to drink alcohol and be overweight, and in the past they were more likely to smoke. All three are significant risk factors for a range of cancer types,” said a separate men’s cancer briefing, produced by CRUK and also released on Tuesday.

“Ciaran Devane, chief executive of Macmillan Cancer Support, said the stark difference was alarming. He highlighted late diagnosis as a key factor and cited the fact that 24% of men with prostate cancer visited their GP at least three times before their disease was identified, compared with 8% of women with breast cancer, according to the National Cancer Experience Survey. In 2011 CRUK estimated that 45% of all cancers in men could be prevented if men stopped smoking, ate a healthier diet, drank less and weighed less.”

 

For more, see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/jan/29/men-cancer-deaths-greater-women

 

Iran sanctions deny medicine to 6-million

Economic sanctions like those now in place for Iran are intended to put pressure on a national government by making things tough for businesses. The sanctions now in place by the U.S. and European Union restrict sales to Iran of just about everything, except medical items and food, which are permitted though a case-by-case basis permitting process. Unfortunately, the permitting process is so slow that as many as 6-million Iranians now are not receiving needed medicines. Many of those affected are cancer patients. As reported in Al Jazeera, The New York Times, and elsewhere, efforts are now underway to correct what has recently been recognized as a public health crisis in Iran, largely resulting from U.S. actions. The news of Iranian suffering is further escalating anti-American sentiment.

In “Iran Sanctions Take Unexpected Toll on Medical Imports,” Thomas Erdbrink writes, “Sitting on one of the Continue reading “Iran sanctions deny medicine to 6-million”