Health priorities

This refers to the editorial 'Need for awareness' (Oct 11). There is an old adage -- 'prevention is better than cure'. In our case, prevention is not only better, it is cheaper. More than twenty years ago, we at IRNUM Peshawar analysed our patients (published in reputable journals) and found out that breast cancer was the most common malady in our cancer patients like in the West but that the majority of our patients were in the advanced stages because of illiteracy and poverty unlike in the economically advanced countries.

Therefore, there is a dire need to set our national priorities right, which should be: quality education, poverty alleviation and economic development which will not only prevent and detect early breast cancer but also ameliorate other chronic ills in society.

Dr Sher Mohammad Khan

Peshawar