100kg python dies of lung cancer at bird sanctuary | Look At Vietnam

100kg python dies of lung cancer at bird sanctuary

March 21, 2012

LookAtVietnam – A rare reticulated python of nearly 100kg in weight was reported dead at a bird sanctuary in the southern province of Bac Lieu. The python will be stuffed for display at the sanctuary.

The sanctuary’s director, Mr. Nguyen Trung Chanh, said on March 19, that the python was caught from the nature and transferred to the sanctuary over a year ago.
The python was found caught in a net in the forest by the sanctuary’s chief guard. It was brought to the sanctuary and measured to be 5.2m long and nearly 100kg in weight.
This was a female python of over 20 years old. The python was raised at the sanctuary for preservation.
The python was sick for several months. She abandoned food and water. Veterinary doctors said that the python suffered from lung cancer and she could not be familiar with the life in cage.
The python died last week. It will be stuffed to serve tourists.

Thu Hang

Cancer top threat to human life: Ministry

Photo: Chuck Kuhn Photography

VietNamNet Bridge - Nearly 200,000 Vietnamese will contract cancer and 100,000 will die of the disease during this and next year, making it the biggest threat to public health, among non-contagious diseases, warned the Ministry of Health.

The warning was annouced at a meeting in Hanoi on July 8 to review one year of implementing the national goals on cancer prevention and treatment and to discuss plans for 2009-2010.

Deputy Minister Nguyen Thi Xuyen said at that the project was first started in 2008 to promote cancer prevention and treatment at local medical centres to gradually reduce mortality rates and improve the living conditions of cancer patients.

The Deputy Director of the Tumours and Cancers Hospital Dr. Tran Van Thuan said that recent surveys have shown poor public awareness of the disease as well as obsolete technical infrastructure at major hospitals in all 63 provinces and cities.

Out of 12,050 people surveyed in 12 provinces and cities, only 35 percent gave the correct answers. 67.2 percent said cancer is incurable so early or late diagnosis doesn’t make any difference, and 35.8 percent believed that surgery makes cancer grow faster and actually hastesn a patient’s death.

Nine out of 63 major hospitals at the provincial level in the survey have not yet set up a department of oncology and 10 others have refused to treat cancer patients at all.

This is a major cause of the increasing number of cancer patients, and deaths, in Vietnam, he emphasised.

To cope with the problem, the project is designed to help all pilot provinces and cities to launch information and education campaigns to raise public awareness of the disease at a local level.

It has also set a target of providing medical check-ups for the early diagnosis of breast and uterine cancers for 50,000 women in the high-risk age group. Surveys on cancer at communal level will be conducted in the central city of Danang and the southern province of Kien Giang .

Over the past year, the project has helped to set up five additional tumour and cancer departments at hospitals in five provinces, four in the north and one in the central region.

In addition, over 31,500 women in the high risk age group between 30 and 54 have undergone medical check-ups for breast and uterine cancers.

The project has also helped to set up a model of community-based medical treatments for cancer patients in a critical condition in Hanoi and the central province of Thua Thien-Hue . The Cancer and Tumour Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City has opened a department to manage pain and track the development of cancers under the project.

Breast and uterine cancers affected 27.3 women out of every 100,000 people in the north and 17.1 of every 100,000 in the south.

For men, lung and stomach cancers are the biggest threat.

VNN/VNS

Burning incense linked to respiratory cancers

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Burning incense may create a sweet scent, but regularly inhaling the smoke could put people at risk of cancers of the respiratory tract, researchers reported Monday.
In a study of more than 61,000 ethnic Chinese living in Singapore who were followed for up to 12 years, the investigators found a link between heavy incense use and various respiratory cancers.
The findings are published in the medical journal Cancer.
Incense has been used for millennia in many cultures' religious and spiritual ceremonies. In Asia, people commonly burn incense in their homes -- a practice that is becoming more popular in Western countries as well.
Incense is usually derived from fragrant plant materials, like tree bark, resins, roots, flowers and essential oils. Past research has found that burning these materials can produce potentially cancer-causing substances, including benzene and polyaromatic hydrocarbons.
However, no studies until now had linked the practice of burning incense to an increased cancer risk over time, according to the researchers, led by Dr. Jeppe T. Friborg of the Statens Serum Institute in Copenhagen.
For their study, the researchers followed 61,320 Singapore Chinese men and women between the ages of 45 and 74 from the Hokkien or Cantonese dialect group. All of the subjects were cancer-free at the outset.
Participants reported on their typical incense use, including how often they burned it in their homes and for how long -- only at night, for instance, or all day and night.
Over the next 12 years, 325 men and women developed cancer of the upper respiratory tract, such as nasal, oral or throat cancer. Another 821 developed lung cancer. Continued...


more info-->>Burning incense linked to respiratory cancers Health Reuters