Sadly, most of us know someone who has cancer or who has died from it. It is now the number one killer in Canada, surpassing heart disease. It wasn't always like this. So what gives? A recent groundbreaking study points to evidence that environmental pollutants have dramatically increased our rate of cancer in general and of breast cancer in particular. As someone whose father died from leukemia and whose mother has battled breast cancer, this information hits home.
Despite decades of study, debate, and public concern, Canada still does not have comprehensive policies to prevent cancer due to occupational or environmental sources, nor does it have in place the system necessary to identify exposure to carcinogens or track the cancers that result. The bottom line is that we still invest very little into the prevention of cancer compared to the money we spend to treat it.
According to the most recent statistics from the National Cancer Institute of Canada, 38 per cent of women and 44 per cent of men will develop cancer during their lifetimes - of those, 24 per cent of women and 29 per cent of men will die from it. While lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer deaths, incidence of other cancers continues to grow, especially breast cancer in women and prostate cancer in men. Once considered rare to non existent, there's also more cancer among children.
Although we know more about workplace carcinogens there are still many others widely in use in industry, released into the environment, and used in consumer products. Some experts still debate how many cancers are due to these exposures compared to other known carcinogens such as tobacco smoke, diet, and physical inactivity. But there isn't much disagreement that the majority of cancers are preventable.
Since the 1960s and groundbreaking books such as Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, there has been more and more research revolving around the cancer-environment connection. Carson revealed that synthetic pesticides have the ability to not only kill their intended targets, but they also move right up the food chain, eventually reaching humans. The pesticides then build up in the tissues of the body, where they interact with other ingested chemicals, causing cancer and a host of other unpleasant ailments. Ironically, Carson, who reportedly had no family history of breast cancer, was never a smoker or drinker and exercised regularly, died of breast cancer in 1965 at the age of 56.
Written in a similar vein is Sandra Steingraber's Living Downstream. In this 1997 scientific narrative on the environmental causes of cancer, Steingraber provides personal experiences (about her friend's deadly rare spinal chord cancer and her bladder cancer) backed by examinations of cancer registry data, the rise of our petrochemical-based economy, and the effects of endocrine-disrupting chemicals on human health and ecosystems. She also uses data to illustrate the overuse of incineration as a treatment technology for the reduction of hazardous waste.
Most recently, a report jointly published by the U.S. non-profit organizations Breast Cancer Fund and Breast Cancer Action found that half of breast cancer causes may be environmental. The report, "State of the Evidence 2006: What Is the Connection Between the Environment and Breast Cancer?", provides compelling evidence that some of the 100,000 synthetic chemicals in use today are contributing to the development of breast cancer, either by altering hormone function or gene expression. According to the report, women living within one mile of hazardous waste sites have an increased risk of breast cancer.
Have these issues been noted north of the 49th parallel as well?
There has been some progress in recent years. In terms of waste monitoring, Environment Canada's National Pollutant Release Inventory Report tracks an increasing number of toxic substances released into the environment. The most recent data available indicates that most pollutants were released to the air in 2003, with more than 4.1 billion kilograms of pollutants coming from industrial facilities - including 8.6 million kilograms of suspected cancer causing pollutants. However, we could have more comprehensive tracking of high-risk carcinogens; we should be at least as vigilant as the U.S. Toxic Release Inventory Report.
Provincial cancer registries in Quebec, British Columbia, and Ontario have also slowly begun to develop programs to identify and track occupational cancers.
And finally, in June 2005, the federal government adopted the Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control. The national committee struck as part of the strategy recently produced a report on best practices to prevent occupational and environmental cancers. A major focus of this report is to improve primary prevention and reduce risk factors. Recommendations call for cancer surveillance that brings together the latest epidemiological data and further protection for workers from hazardous exposures.
During the recent federal election campaign, Stephen Harper announced that a new Conservative government would fully implement this five-year cancer strategy at a cost of about $50-million per year. At the time of the announcement he said: "The Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control, developed by over 700 cancer survivors and experts, is a model for an effective national disease strategy. All that has been lacking is the political will to implement it."
Both the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party have also pledged support for a national cancer strategy. As a result, this is an initiative that a minority government can and must accomplish. For some of us, it's quite literally a matter of life or death.
Connie Vitello is editor of this magazine. Please send your comments to connie@hazmatmag.com.