CANCER APPEAL

Hokitika Guardian, 26 May 1930, Page 2

CANCER APPEAL

CAUSES AND RESEARCH

ADDRESS BY DR, CRAAVSHAAV.

CHRISTCHURCH, May 23

“Obtain a medical investigation ot. unusual symptoms of any kind after you reach the age of 40, ’’ was advice given by Dr. J. AV. Crawshaw in the course of an address yesterday afternoon on the subject of the Cancer Fund Campaign. “At that age we are getting past our best, and are reaching the time when cancer is most likely to attack us.

“Cancer is now recognised,” said the doctor, “as a cause of death where fifty years ago the same cause was frequently attributed to other diseases. Hence the generally accepted idea that cancer is on tlie increase is somewhat exaggerated, but there has been an increase sufficiently noticeable .to induce men to undertake research into the means of diminishing it But It has proved an extraordinary difficult mar ady to investigate. AVhat this campaign i,s endeavouring to do is to in-, forest the population of tlie whole Empire in the attempt to cope with what is admittedly a very serious evil

“To illustrate the prevalence ot cancer I may say tout out of oiJ over the age of 40 years whom I have attended recently 18 were suffering from this disease, Those are my own figures, but they servo to show that the percentage is very higri. “I think possibly that an explanation of the preyalence of cancer is in our advanced state pf civilisation,” he continued, “As we depart more from the open-air active existence, so we arc more apt to be subject to this disease.” Dr. Crawshaw did not wish to suggest that the world should go hack to the cave-man era, but expressed the opinion that the present state of civilisation was less conducive to good health than such eras had been.

CAUSE AND RESEARCH

Of the causes of cancer little was 1 nown but it was. a well established; fact that occasion had been known where constant irritation of the skin; had produced a cancerous growth.; Ulay pipes, with rather rough stems, which were used some years ago, had; been known to cause cancer on the lips, and similarly a broken tooth scraping against the tongue had given rise to a growth on the tongue. “There is not; so much certainty in the case of injuries,” he .said, “Nothing, has been found in a cancer which has been definitely proved to be a cause of the, growth;”, . , Research had been carried out in various ways, one being the investigation of. the effect of the irritation of various! substances of the skin, Rabbits’ ears had been painted with crude petroleum oil or tar every day for a long period, and in several’months a growth had arisen, There was a possibility that some knowledge might; al'ise from that, Healthy rats inoculated with the cancer of diseased rats had been infected with the cancer, Yet, a surgeon, in operating on a cancer patient might cut his hand and touch the cut with the cancer from the patient, but no case had ocurred where a spot had grown on the surgeon, and accidents of the typo mentioned took place not infrequently. This knowledge that inoculation should apply to rats, and not to human, had possibilities, There was opportunity for the development of research along these and other lines, “One of the most commonly accepted ideas is that cancer is extraordinarily painful,” said Dr, Clmwshaw. “That is true at the end, but not at the beginning of the disease. If we can impress peopde with that fact, that a. cancer is not painful in the early stages, then we shall have .accomplished some little good. I say that because a growth does not hurt, it most probaby is a cancer,” Dr. Crawshaw mentioned the existence of the International Cancer Union,' which had already met three times at Amsterdam in 1922, at London in K2B and at Paris in March, 1930. “The question is important to individuals, and equally important to nations,’ he concluded.