Jump to full article: REDORBIT (formerly RedNova.com), 2008-05-23
Intro: The risk of getting lung cancer for Chinese males is one in 20 and that for Malays and Indians is one in 40.The number of lung cancer cases has gone up from 2,256 in 2002 to more than 3,000 last year, and the cause has fallen squarely on cigarette smoking.
Almost 70 per cent of the smokers were in the third and fourth stage of the disease when they came in for treatment, Institute of Respiratory Medicine (IRM) director Datin Dr Aziah Ahmad Mahayiddin said.
She said even with the best treatment, their survival rate was slim.
"I just do not know what to do because even when we conduct free lung-function tests for smokers at hospital or at shopping complexes, the smokers never come forward to check their lungs.
"They, instead, ask their wives to check theirs. It is always non- smokers who come forward," she said.
Lung cancer is the most common cancer among males of all three major ethnic groups in Malaysia.
Dr Aziah said IRM, which saw at least two new lung cancer patients every week, was also seeing younger men detected with the disease.
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