The role of viruses in the etiology of cancer has been a focus of scientific inquiry for much of the twentieth century; the more recent development of vaccines against the hepatitis B virus and some types of human papillomavirus has provided an important public health opportunity for preventing the development of liver and cervical cancers, respectively.
A fuller appreciation of this topic is a priority in cancer control. Thus, the National Infectious Agents Committee of the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer’s Primary Prevention Action Group, in partnership with Canadian Cancer Society, sponsored the development and publication of this volume.
Despite signifi cant improvements in cancer prevention, treatment, and survival, more and more Canadians are diagnosed with cancer. This story is repeated in many jurisdictions in the world. One driver of such trends is an aging population, but cancer is not only a disease of the elderly. For example, cancer is the leading cause of death in middleaged adults in Canada. In the 35- to 64-year age group, cancer causes more deaths than heart disease, stroke, injury, and infectious diseases combined.
Over a decade ago, facing the reality of a growing burden of cancer within Canadian society, cancer community stakeholders from across the country identifi ed a need to create a coordinated, national plan for cancer control. The Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control (CSCC) was the volunteer network that drafted such a plan and successfully advocated for its funding. With that funding in place, the work begun by the CSCC is being refi ned and driven forward by the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer (CPAC).
Networks of expert groups are leading efforts across all priority areas of cancer control, supported by CPAC since it began operations on April 1, 2007. One of these eight expert groups is the Primary Prevention Action Group, which in turn includes three subcommittees focused on advancing efforts that are central to the prevention of cancer: the National Committee on Environmental and Occupational Exposure, the National Committee on Skin Cancer Prevention, and the National Committee on Infectious Agents.
This volume was supported by the Partnership through funding by Health Canada and by the Canadian Cancer Society’s National Cancer Institute of Canada. Given the sponsorship and concerns of this book, and active cooperation in medical research across the border, there will sometimes be a Canadian or U.S. focus to the information presented. But as also will become clear in the book, researching the infection/ cancer connection was an international project from the start, and continues to be so.
Although infectious agents have been the focus of etiological and applied research for many decades, the relative interest and the level of research investment on infectious agents in Canada, the United States, and the rest of the developed world has waxed and waned over that time frame. Above and beyond the complexity of the science to understand how viral and bacteriological agents increase the risk for developing cancer, an explanation for the uneven research investment on infectious agents and cancer in the developed world is the fact that the infectionrelated burden is disproportionately found in developing countries.
Moreover, within the developed world, many of the cancers linked to infectious agents (e.g., cervical cancer) disproportionately burden the most vulnerable populations (e.g., low income, ethnic minorities). These underserved populations often have few, if any, voices to advocate for more research investment in addressing the cancers that contribute to the cancer health disparities they experience.
Particularly in the developing world, where resources available for early detection and the treatment of disease are extremely limited, controlling a complex set of diseases like cancer must perforce focus on prevention and palliation. The relatively recent developments of clinical prevention approaches for liver cancer (vaccination against hepatitis B virus) and cervical cancer (vaccination against specifi c types of HPV) hold great promise for cancers that are a much larger public health burden for vulnerable populations worldwide. Thus, this book goes beyond an update of the biological and clinical data relevant to infections that cause cancer by focusing on prevention as a theme of the knowledge synthesis provided.
As suggested earlier, the primary prevention perspective is the particular value that the present book seeks to add to the several published reviews of infectious causes of cancer. It is important to organize the proven and potential interventions so that classic primary prevention categories are clearly delineated. In this way, health care planners worldwide can more easily see where their proposed strategies fi t on the prevention spectrum, thereby promoting comprehensive prevention approaches and clear resource allocation decisions.
This book hopefully will assist those in Canada, the United States, and around the world interested in building on the knowledge gained from research to expand cancer prevention partnership initiatives and enhance the strategies that can be put into practice to prevent cancers linked to infectious agents.
Contents
- 1 Introduction - Infection and Cancer: An Expanding Paradigm
- 2 Human Papillomavirus: Structure, Transmission, and Occurrence
- 3 Human Papillomavirus: Infection, Natural History, and Carcinogenesis
- 4 Human Papillomavirus: Associations with Cervical Cancer
- 5 Human Papillomavirus: Associations with Non cervical Cancer
- 6 Human Papillomavirus: Detection of Infection and Disease
- 7 Human Papillomavirus: Prevention of Infection and Disease
- 8 Hepatitis Viruses
- 9 Helicobacter pylori
- 10 Epstein-Barr Virus
- 11 Human Herpesvirus Type 8
- 12 Human T-cell Lymphotropic Virus Type 1
- 13 Conclusion - Infection and Cancer: A Paradigm Shift
- Index
Book Details
- Hardcover: 560 pages
- Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 1 edition (April 12, 2010)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0199732914
- ISBN-13: 978-0199732913
- Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.4 inches
List Price: $89.95