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America Has 15.5 Million Cancer Survivors

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Cancer survivors taking the survivor lap

America has a high number of cancer survivors.

(Mirror Daily, United States) – The United States has reached a 15.5 million record number of cancer survivors this year and according to the American Cancer Society, in 10 years they will be over 20 million.

However, there is a high demand for psychological, emotional and medical support to assure the long-term recovery of the survivors.

According to Kimberly Miller, American Cancer Society epidemiologist, it is crucial for all cancer survivors to deal with long-term psychological and physical effects of their cancer treatment. Plus, the public health community must become more committed to supporting these survivors.

The study authors underlined the fact that cancer rates dropped off for men and stabilized for women thanks to improved treatment and detection.

In addition to this, the aging population has grown as the statistics have shown that around half of the survivors are at least 70 years old, and 56 percent of them were diagnosed during the past 10 years. One-third of them were diagnosed 5 five years ago or less.

Men survivors used to suffer from melanoma, 614,000; colon or rectal cancer, 725,000; and prostate cancer, 3.3 million. Women survivors mostly suffered from colon or rectal cancer, 727,000; uterine cancer, 757,000; and breast cancer, 3.5 million.

However, these are not the most encountered forms of cancer because lung cancer is the second most frequently diagnosed in men, but it is ranked eighth among survivors because only a few fight back this disease.

Another finding regarding survivors is that there is a strong connection between their age and the type of cancer. For instance, 65,000 cancer survivors are 14 years old or under, whereas 47,000 are 15 to 19 years old. Furthermore, 64 percent of prostate cancer survivors are at least 70 years old compared to just 37 percent of melanoma survivors.

According to Dr. Stephanie Bernik, chief of surgical oncology at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, because cancer has a tremendous impact on patients and their families, it is crucial to provide them with physical, financial and emotional support. Bernik underlined that cancer also affects the patient’s mind and spirit, making the fight with this disease at least twice more difficult.

Cancer survivors are those who are cancer free, have a history of cancer and the ones still in treatment.

Image Source:Bangor Daily News

Annually Five Million Individuals Die Because of Pollution

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"Chinese woman with mask on her face trying to protect her lungs from pollution"

Annually five million individuals die because of pollution, and one million are only in China.

(Mirror Daily, United States) – According to a new report that was released this Friday, annually five million individuals die because of pollution. The majority of deaths take place in India and China where they still have coal-fired factories and power plants that fill the air with a dense smog.

According to the authors of the study, illnesses that derive from household and air pollution are the number two cause of deaths worldwide. The five million individuals that lose their life because of pollution are just behind the six million that die due to smoking, according to the Organization for World Health (WHO).

The research is part of a broader initiative that is keen on monitoring the global burden of illnesses. The paper will be presented by the researchers at the annual meeting of the Washington’s Advancement of Science American Association.

Air pollution is made out of a great variety of particulate matter that originates from transportation, open burn and power generation. More precisely it consists of the waste that cars and big power plants and factories leave behind them.

Household pollution is as dangerous as air pollution and it is generated by the burning of wood, coal or animal dung in household stoves. These materials are usually burned in stoves in Africa and India and have a double purpose of cooking and heating.

Both types of pollution can lead to serious health complications like strokes and heart attacks. Almost one million individuals die each year in China because of pollution. That is a fifth of the deaths that are registered worldwide.

India loses more than a half of million inhabitants each year and the United States registers approximately 300,000 deaths each year that are caused by pollution.

The co-author of the study, Dan Greenbaum, who is also the president of the Boston’s Institute of Health Effects declared that they used data from 2013 for their reports. But as he said, the numbers don’t change very much from year to year, so the report is not affected.

The government in China is aware of the problem that they are facing and is actively and aggressively trying to implement measures that will improve the quality of the country’s air. The government officials are forcing automobiles to be equipped with environmentally friendly technology and the power plants to lower their particulates emissions.

But the pollution in China is spreading over the country’s territory and towards the West Coast of the United States. Annually five million individuals die because of pollution and one million are only in China.

According to the estimates, the numbers could reach 1.3 million individuals by 2030 if they will not drastically change their polluting factors.

Image source: www.flickr.com

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