• Submitted by: manso
• Society
• 02 / 06 / 2011

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2011.02.04 - 16:44:26 / radiorebelde.Havana, Cuba.- For the first time, Cuba will carry out a campaign of education and research with respect to malignant and pre-malignant lesions on the skin, which began today, February 4, World Cancer Day.

Dr. Olaine Gray, a dermatology specialists and head of that service at Havana’s Comandante Manuel Fajardo Teaching Hospital, told ACN that doctor’s offices in all of the country’s health institutions, including policlinics, have been fit out with this purpose.

She warned that, in the presence of a suspicious lesion on the skin, changes in a mole, or pigmented dark spots, patients should visit a doctor, since the earlier a lesion is diagnosed the higher the prospects of cure will be.

The national meeting to mark the date calls on dermatologists –like in many nations around the world- to actively participate in the education and prevention of skin cancer, which is among the first locations of that malignant disease, of which over 5,000 cases are reported in Cuba every year.

This is principally due to geographic location and population aging, added to people’s tendency to get suntanned, she specified.

The main etiological agent of skin cancer are the ultraviolet radiations emitted by the sun, intensified by a decrease in the ozone layer and cloudiness.

Every February 4, the World Health Organization supports the International Association against Cancer and promotes ways to alleviate the world from the burden of this disease, which is found among the main causes of death worldwide.

Every year, it kills almost eight million people, and some 13 million new cases are detected.(ACN)