In the last 20 years, there has been a 50 percent increase in cancer cases in GCC countries, experts at a medical workshop held here said. About 50 percent of the cases in the Gulf are discovered when the disease is in its advanced stages; compared to advanced countries, a relatively high number of cancer cases are diagnosed among young people, according to the Gulf Center for Registering Cancer Cases. The information was related during the inauguration of the Gulf Workshop for Combating Cancer organized by King Faisal Specialist Hospital in cooperation with the Executive Office of the Council of GCC Health Ministers, Asharq Al-Awsat reported at the weekend. Health authorities need to take effective steps to detect and prevent the disease, said Dr. Qassim Al-Qassabi, executive supervisor general of the General Organization for King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center in Riyadh. From 1998 until 2007, about 95,000 cancer cases were diagnosed in the six GCC countries; women had just over 50 percent of the cases and the annual rate of affliction was 79 cases per every 100,000 people, according to the latest statistics. Earlier this year, King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center was approved by the GCC Ministers of Health as a reference center and a strategic partner for developing the Gulf Center for Combating Cancer, Dr. Al-Qassabi said. Dr. Ian Magrath, an international expert and director of the International Network for Cancer Research and Treatment, laid down the center's bases and fields of work. The workshop, which concluded on Thursday, was attended by 40 experts from the GCC countries, said Dr. Ali Bin Sa'eed Al-Zahrani, deputy executive director of the Research Center at King Faisal Specialist Hospital and director of the Gulf Center for Combating Cancer. The workshop discussed several topics including the means to develop and train health workers; establishing unified criteria for diagnosing and treating cancer; coordinating the participation of the society in programs to combat and prevent cancer; specifying priorities for scientific research that focuses on evaluation and development of programs for early detection of cancer; and methods of combating the disease.
