The government has been successful in introducing public health measures to reduce the prevalence of betel nut chewing in men, especially among those in their 30s, researchers at the National Health Research Institutes (NHRI) and Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday.
Yang Yi-hsin (楊奕馨), an investigator at the National Institute of Cancer Research, said that more than 90 percent of oral cancer patients in Taiwan chew betel nuts, and oral cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer deaths among men in the nation, with a standardized mortality rate of 15.04 per 100,000 population.
“If the habit of chewing betel nuts can be effectively controlled, the incidence rate of oral cancer in Taiwan is expected to reduce significantly,” Yang said.
A foreign study on the correlation between the prevalence of betel nut chewing and the incidence of oral cancer in Taiwan and other Asian countries suggested that if everyone stopped chewing betel nuts, the incidence of oral cancer could be reduced by at least 50 percent, she said.
Encouraging people to quit chewing betel nuts is key to oral cancer prevention in Taiwan, Yang added.
A study by Yang and HPA officials, published in the international medical journal Oral Oncology in July, showed that through the introduction of public health measures, the prevalence rate of betel nut chewing dropped from 17.2 percent in 2007 to below 7 percent in 2018.
The rate declined the most among men aged 30 to 39, dropping by about 1.7 percent per year, the study showed.
“Taiwan is the only nation that has a regular government-funded oral cancer scanning program,” Yang said, adding that that helps with early diagnosis and effective treatment of oral precancerous lesions and increases survival rates.
Many oral cancer patients who had never undergone a screening were only diagnosed in the advanced stages of the disease, she added.
While the screening program was launched in 2007, other public health measures include health promotion programs on school campuses and in local communities to raise public awareness about the dangers of chewing betel nuts; finding high-risk groups and holding cessation programs; encouraging betel nut farmers to grow other crops; and imposing fines for spitting betel nut juice, she said.
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