KARACHI, Dec 13: Cancer, at present inflicting five to 10 per cent of the total population, is feared to assume higher proportions mainly due to the fast deteriorating environment and growing atmospheric pollution alongwith soil and water contamination around the country.

It was in the very backdrop, and also owing to the fact that south central Asian region (including Pakistan) shares 11 per cent of the global burden of cancer-induced deaths, that Aga Khan University Hospital commenced construction of its new oncology services building with provision for a comprehensive cancer centre here on Saturday.

AKU President Shams Kassim Lakha, addressing the ground-breaking ceremony of the project, said the foundation laying of the same performed by Prince Karim Aga Khan on December 6 this year, was planned to be fully operational by November 2005 against an estimated cost of US$7.6 million.

He particularly appreciated the Resource Development Committee’s commitment, generating donors’ support amounting to $4 million for the project coupled with AKUH funding of $3.6 million despite little impressive charity culture in the country, also witnessed to a growing tendency to patronize projects on the basis of community and Bradari affiliations.

The AKU is a national university where full spectrum of people from across Pakistan are served and those who also deliver their services in different capacities, he said.

Medical Director and Associate Dean, Clinical Affairs at the AKUH and the Chair of the Oncology Services Building Task Force, Dr Farhat Abbas, in his presentation, said that Pakistan, experiencing a rapid increase in its population with an improved life expectancy rate among both male and females, was simultaneously registered to have a considerably high rate of cancer incidence.

Maintaining that an estimated five to ten per cent of Pakistan’s population could be affected by cancer in life time, the speaker said the country was exposed to a difficult situation as most of the cancer cases here were detected while in advance stage in nature, due to lack effective management in proper and early detection of the disease.

He dispelled the impression that it was a disease mainly affecting people in the West. He said that more than 50 per cent of over nine million cases diagnosed worldwide occur in the developing countries.

“About 11 per cent of global cancer-related mortality and total case burden is observed in the south central Asian region alone,” Dr Abbas said.—APP