Does Air Pollution Cause Cancer?
CFA Responds to Recent Case Report of Advanced Lung Cancer in a 28-Year Old Delhi Woman
CFA applauds vigilant doctors who are publicly reporting their concerns about cases such as the recent diagnosis of stage 4 lung cancer in a young woman non-smoker patient in Delhi. Doctors are at the front line of public health, and in a direct position to characterise and diagnose these type of illnesses. Their experience and observations about their patients are critical and worth noting.
However, it would be inaccurate for the media to state that this or any other individual case is “proof” that air pollution is the cause of stage 4 lung cancer in young people in Delhi. Many factors contribute to developing this type of cancer. To establish causality of air pollution exposure with this type of cancer requires an epidemiological analysis over far larger numbers of people in the entire population.
India has the researchers, expertise, and capability to conduct the research and analyses required to determine whether air pollution exposure causes the advanced lung cancers in non-smokers that individual doctors are observing and reporting. The findings from population-level analyses would truly help our Indian policy makers and health care system to respond to this as well as many other health harms associated with air pollution.
Care for Air strongly recommends that the government, public health and research institutions, in collaboration with hospitals and doctors, use this important information with their expertise and capabilities to conduct such population-level epidemiological studies on priority, while concurrently taking urgent and immediate steps to drastically reduce emissions so that air pollution exposure is minimised in order to prevent all types of health harm, including cancers, in Delhi and India.
We know conclusively that increases in air pollution is associated with increased risk of a number of cancers and other diseases, and air pollution is definitively one of several causative factors for cancers. However, this evidence derives from review of population-level data globally, not from individual patient case reports.
Doctors’ observations and concerns continue to remind us that we are living in an air pollution crisis and must continuously work towards minimising air pollution exposure in our populations. But to influence public health policies with regard to this type of reported cancer case, we need to pool such patient case data and conduct epidemiological study at the population level.
However, it would be inaccurate for the media to state that this or any other individual case is “proof” that air pollution is the cause of stage 4 lung cancer in young people in Delhi. Many factors contribute to developing this type of cancer. To establish causality of air pollution exposure with this type of cancer requires an epidemiological analysis over far larger numbers of people in the entire population.
India has the researchers, expertise, and capability to conduct the research and analyses required to determine whether air pollution exposure causes the advanced lung cancers in non-smokers that individual doctors are observing and reporting. The findings from population-level analyses would truly help our Indian policy makers and health care system to respond to this as well as many other health harms associated with air pollution.
Care for Air strongly recommends that the government, public health and research institutions, in collaboration with hospitals and doctors, use this important information with their expertise and capabilities to conduct such population-level epidemiological studies on priority, while concurrently taking urgent and immediate steps to drastically reduce emissions so that air pollution exposure is minimised in order to prevent all types of health harm, including cancers, in Delhi and India.
We know conclusively that increases in air pollution is associated with increased risk of a number of cancers and other diseases, and air pollution is definitively one of several causative factors for cancers. However, this evidence derives from review of population-level data globally, not from individual patient case reports.
Doctors’ observations and concerns continue to remind us that we are living in an air pollution crisis and must continuously work towards minimising air pollution exposure in our populations. But to influence public health policies with regard to this type of reported cancer case, we need to pool such patient case data and conduct epidemiological study at the population level.