Baku, Azerbaijan, April 21
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
The number of cancer patients in Iran increases by 20 to 30 percent every year.
Head of the Iranian Internal Medicine Association Iraj Khosronia forecasted that the number of cancer patients in Iran will reach 400,000 people by the end of current Iranian calendar year(started on March 21), the country's ISNA news agency reported on April 21.
Statistics indicate that the number of people who die of cancer in Iran is higher compared to the other countries due to late diagnosis, he added.
Breast cancer is high among Iranian women, Khosronia said, adding that breast cancer topped the list of cancer incidences in Iran with some 30-32 percent, followed by skin cancer (23 percent) and gastrointestinal cancer (14 percent) among Iranians.
Approximately some 0.132 percent of men and 0.123 percent of women catch cancer in Iran, he remarked.
Khosronia went on to say that some 14 percent of cancer patients die in the country, however the figure in some countries such as the US, Japan and Canada is lower than 10 percent.
Iranian media outlets claim that cancer is the third top reason for deaths in Iran, as every day about 105 people in the country die of cancer.
Official statistics in Iran say there are about 63,000 cases of cancer reported in the country annually.
Some 41,000 people died in Iran due to cancer during the Iranian calendar year of 1391(ended on March 21, 2013), and annually about 85,000 people catch cancer in the country, according to the head of Cancer Research Center in Iran, Mohammad Ismayil Akbari.
Edited by C.N.