3,000 cancer deaths prevented

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Cancer survivor Victor Morello now volunteers his time to drive other cancer patients to their treatment appointments. (PHIL HOSSACK / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store

The payoff from more cancer screening and fewer smokers can be seen in the lives still being lived across the country.

According to statistics the Canadian Cancer Society (Manitoba Division) will release today, about 3,000 Manitobans were saved in the last 20 years because of declining smoking rates and more screening tests.

And across Canada, about 100,000 lives were saved.

Victor Morello is one of the local cancer survivors.

Morello, 75, was diagnosed with throat cancer three years ago. He has been cancer-free since being treated.

"I was a smoker," he said.

"I started when I was 12 because it was the in thing. I was a two-pack-a-day smoker."

But Morello said he puffed his last 12 years before his cancer diagnosis.

"I asked the doctor how could that be and the doctor said the damage was already done," he said.

"If it was today, I wouldn't have picked up the habit."

Will Cooke, the society's local tobacco advocacy co-ordinator, said the reduction in smoking in the last few decades has been "a massive public health achievement.

"There were more than 60 per cent (of Canadian men in the 1960s) smoking and we had high lung-cancer rates. Now there has been a 30-per-cent reduction in lung-cancer rates between 1988 and 2010.

Cooke said it has taken decades for a reduction in cancer rates linked to reduced smoking to transpire. "People get lung cancer from smoking a long time and the rates don't drop overnight," he said.

Cooke said because women were slower to kick the smoking habit in high numbers, taking until the early 1980s, the lung-cancer rate for women hasn't dropped yet.

Cooke said this year alone, the cancer society will invest $4 million in lung-cancer and tobacco-related research projects.

He said screening tests like those for colorectal, cervical and breast cancer have resulted in lower cancer death rates.

But Cooke said despite the successes seen against lung cancer and other cancers, there will still be thousands of Canadians who die from the disease.

This year, the society estimates where will be about 186,400 new cancer cases diagnosed, not including 81,000 cases of non-melanoma skin cancer.

The society estimates more than 75,000 Canadians will die from cancer this year.

"There is still a lot of work to be done, but there's been great progress," Cooke said.

Today, Morello is one of the local society's 10,000 volunteers.

He drives cancer patients from their residences to their treatment appointments.

"I was getting morphine during my treatment and I didn't know if I was coming or going," he said.

"My wife couldn't drive and drop me off because, since I was on morphine, I might have disappeared. So I was driven by the society's volunteer drivers.

"I didn't have to worry about the car or parking so I decided that if I got free of cancer I would volunteer. I have now for three years."

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca

Then and now

FACTS about cancer in Canada and Manitoba:

the overall death rate dropped by 21 per cent for men and nine per cent for women from 1988 to 2007.

about 100,000 lives -- including 3,000 in Manitoba -- were saved in the last 20 years, thanks to the drop in the death rate.

smoking for Canadian men 15 years of age and older was 61 per cent in 1965. By 2010, it had dropped to 20 per cent. Manitoba's current smoking rate is 21 per cent.

lung-cancer deaths of men have dropped by 30 per cent since 1988.

an estimated 6,100 Manitobans -- or an average of 17 a day -- will be diagnosed with cancer this year.

40 per cent of women and 45 per cent of men will be diagnosed with cancer during their lives.

an estimated 2,850 Manitobans will die from cancer this year, as well as 75,700 Canadians. One out of every four Canadians currently dies from cancer.

breast, prostate, lung and colorectal will account for more than half, 54 per cent, of all cancers diagnosed this year.

every hour across the country, 21 people will be newly diagnosed with cancer and nine people will die.

-- Source:

Canadian Cancer Society

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 9, 2012 A3