Breast cancer in women and lung cancer in men have taken the top spot when it comes to cancer cases being recorded in Delhi.
According to an ICMR cancer factsheet, prepared based on data collected over a period of 10 years, 27.8% of female cancer patients had breast cancer, while 10.5% of male cancer patients had lung cancer.
To reach the conclusion, the ICMR, in collaboration with NCIDR (National Centre for Disease Informatics and Research), collected 10-year data from seven Delhi hospitals until 2021. Officials said they looked at the ‘Report of the National Cancer Registry Programme’, which compiles data of all cases of the disease reported at various hospitals. However, they did not share the number of cases they had assessed.
The hospitals they looked at in the city are Dr BR Ambedkar Institute Rotary Cancer Hospital; Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences; Max Cancer Centre; Max Super Speciality Hospitals; Maulana Azad Medical College; and Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute and Research Centre.
“The trend has been going on for the last 10 years and cancer in men and women is mostly because of urbanisation and lifestyle factors. Late marriages, obesity, fewer children and late childbirth lead to hormonal changes in the body which cause cancer (among women). Lung cancer is mostly related to smoking and pollution,” said Dr SVS Deo, head of surgical oncology at AIIMS Delhi.
As per ICMR data, tobacco contributed to 41.2% of cancer cases in Delhi’s men and 12.4% in women.
Dr Deo said many women have started coming forward for early screening, and in some cases, those with cancer-causing genes opt for mastectomy: “But only 10-15% of breast cancers can run in families because of genetic defects and 80% are due to sedentary lifestyle factors.”
The cancer data, collected through a network of population-based cancer registries (PBCRs) and hospital-based cancer registries (HBCRs) of seven hospitals in Delhi, showed that mouth and cervical cancer were the second-most common cancers in men and women respectively. Around 7.5% of male cancer patients had mouth cancer and 10% of female cancer patients had the disease in their cervix.
Dr Deo said that while breast cancer is on the rise, cervical cancer cases are decreasing. “Overall improvement in women’s hygiene, sexual practices, screening programmes for cervical cancers over the past 10-15 years, along with better vaccination, have resulted in this.”
Data from the Delhi State Cancer Institute, which provides a vaccine against cervical cancer, states that 14,025 vaccines have been administered to women in Delhi since 2016. “On an average, per month, we were able to vaccinate 509 women and the demographics of recipients remained between 11 and 26 years, unmarried women,” said an official.
According to Dr Ishu Gupta, Consultant of Medical Oncology at Fortis Hospital, Noida, there are three types of human papillomavirus vaccines available commercially. “In our experience, more patients have become aware of the need for the vaccine, and for the very same reason, more people are coming forward to take it…,” said Dr Gupta.