World Cancer Day

Overview
World Cancer Day is marked on the February 4th to raise awareness of the global impact of cancer and increase understanding of prevention, detection, treatment and care. Led by the International Union Against Cancer (UICC) — a global consortium of more than 280 cancer-fighting organizations in over 90 countries — World Cancer Day 2007 marked the first truly global recognition of this awareness day with the launch of the World Cancer Campaign called "Today's Children, Tomorrow's World." The five-year initiative underscores habits that parents can share with children to prevent cancer later in life. It's a striking statistic: 43% of cancers can be prevented through these healthy behaviours:

• Provide a smoke-free environment for children • Be physically active, eat a balanced, healthy diet, and avoid obesity • Learn about vaccines for virus-related liver and cervical cancers • Avoid over-exposure to the sun

Media in more than 50 countries spanning two dozen languages carried these key cancer-prevention messages in 2007 pegged to February 4. In addition to targeting the public through global communications marking World Cancer Day, the UICC encourages policy makers and member organizations to put cancer on the political agenda to drive home the regional relevance of cancer prevention. As a result, cancer-fighting organizations in 35 countries led prevention advocacy events on World Cancer Day 2007. .

World Cancer Day 2006 was dedicated to raising awareness about childhood cancer. Under the slogan "My Child Matters" — the UICC announced a programme to promote early detection and access to treatment for children with cancer in limited-resources settings. []

World Cancer Day is a principal component of the UICC member-driven World Cancer Campaign. The World Cancer Campaign is a response to the Charter of Paris adopted on 4 February 2000 at the World Summit Against Cancer for the Millenium. This called for "an invincible alliance - between researchers, health-care professionals, patients, governments, industry and media - to fight cancer and its greatest allies, which are fear, ignorance and complacency."