Lung specialists from all over Europe argued in the medical journal The Lancet Oncology at the end of last year for free scans for lung cancer. The screening is intended for all people with an increased risk. In practice, these are mainly heavy smokers or people who have smoked heavily. We are curious about your opinion on this.
Advantages
The lung specialists base themselves on twelve European studies and want the screening to be introduced as soon as possible. If lung cancer is detected early during a screening, surgery is often possible. That saves lives. Furthermore, the smokers who undergo screening will be offered a cessation program, according to the proposal. This also helps to get more people to stop smoking and to reduce the risk of smoking diseases.
Cons
The disadvantage is that the screening has not yet been thoroughly tested to properly recognize lung cancer. Sometimes ‘healthy’ pieces of lung are incorrectly removed. The lung specialists themselves also believe that this should be improved. A CT scan in turn gives a dose of harmful radiation, but the suggestion is to choose a scan with little radiation.
An ethical objection is that screening costs a lot of money. Not everyone thinks it is a good idea that public money goes to heavy (ex-) smokers, who also have themselves to blame for the addiction. On the other hand, the latter is increasingly being combated: addiction is more persistent than will and is also fueled in all sorts of ways by the industry.
read here more about the proposal.
Statement: heavy smokers should get a free check for lung cancer
- read more about Statement: heavy smokers should get a free check for lung cancer
