Lung Cancer Essays -- A Level Essays

Lung Cancer Lung cancer is the number one killer of cancers of both men and women here in the United States. It accounts for 28% of the death rates due to cancer. In 1999, it is estimated that 1,221,800 new cases of cancer are expected to occur and out of these 171,600 are to be cases of lung cancer. (Meyer 1990) If lung cancer is the number one killer in the United States, one must wonder how it affects other countries around the world. One will find that the United States does not even have the worse statistics of death from lung cancer. Scotland, England, and Finland are the top three, then is the United States in the middle and below us are: Canada, Australia, El Salvador, and Syrian Arab countries. Lung cancer is more commonly found in developed countries, because years ago, the upper class smoked cigarettes or cigars. The nicotine addiction had lasted through the years and spread to middle and lower class; but in Third World countries, they did not have to worry about this factor. They did not have the extra money to spend on killing themselves; they were just worried about surviving and so this addiction never started. (Meyer 1990) Here in the United States lung cancer is not found in one specific region. Highly polluted areas have more of a risk of housing those with lung cancer because they contain diesel and fossil fuels, which is known to attribute to lung cancer. Mining Caves, can also be a founding place for cancer because they contain radon, another agent in causing lung cancer. It has also been proven that those who work with asbestos have a greater risk of developing lung cancer. And of course anyone who smokes is at a higher risk of lung cancer than non-smokers are. (... ...re also needs to be more clinical research on lung cancer. Without research, we are never going to find a cure or other ways to treat this disease. Another way to close this gap is for insurance companies not to have the right to deny insurance to applicants due to past or present history. That is discrimination and I do not feel that the government is watching this very closely. So in order for a person to receive proper treatment, the government has to make sure that the insurance agencies are not discriminating. Lung cancer takes a substantial number of lives every year. The lives that it takes belong to families and friends. We can help in making lung cancer more public ourselves. We can get involved with cancer research and volunteer or time. We cannot just leave it up to the government and clinical researchers; it is up to us too!