5 Actions Governments Can Take to Fight Cancer
Most cancers are preventable, and governments play the key role in ensuring that people are protected from known risk factors to promote healthy environments and behaviors. This World Cancer Day, we’re bringing attention to concrete steps that governments can take to prevent avoidable cases of this deadly disease — and to champion efforts in countries around the world that are already paving the way.
1. Raise Taxes on Tobacco Products
More than one in five cancer deaths are related to tobacco use, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The single most effective way to reduce tobacco use is for governments to increase taxes on tobacco products to make them less affordable. Tobacco taxes are a win/win for governments, generating health gains by encouraging smokers to quit and helping prevent youth from starting, and generating revenue that can be used to fund public health initiatives. To maximize health gains, these taxes should be taken up with additional measures such as banning smoking in public spaces and banning tobacco advertising.
2. Encourage Physical Activity Through Urban Planning
One in four adults worldwide is not active enough, a major risk factor for cancer. Cities can drive healthy behavior by creating efficient, safe street designs that encourage walking and biking.
Caption: Santo Domingo Mayor David Collado (in stripes) joined city officials and technical experts from the World Resources Institute (WRI) in one of the areas targeted by city’s walkable/bikeable Partnership initiative.
3. Require Warning Labels on the Front of Food Packaging
When consumers have clear information about high amounts of sugar, salt and saturated fat in foods and beverages, they are empowered to make healthy choices. Requiring a warning label system on the front of food packaging is a simple measure that governments can adopt to prevent obesity, another risk factor for cancer.
4. Increase Taxes on Alcohol Beverages
Scientific evidence suggests that alcohol use is strongly tied to seven types of cancer, including cancers of the head, neck, mouth, esophagus, liver, breast and colon. By raising alcohol taxes on alcoholic beverages, as with tobacco, governments can help curb harmful alcohol use. Regulating how, when and to whom it is available and restricting alcohol-related advertising are additional steps that governments can take to prevent cancer.
5. Enforce Clean Air Policies to Reduce Pollution
Air pollution contributes to lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide. Policymakers can fight pollution’s impact on health by committing to rigorous air quality surveillance and enforcing policies to reduce pollutants. Vital Strategies’ “Accelerating City Progress on Clean Air” is a guide to fast-tracking proven approaches and innovations. The publication provides a step-by-step approach for city governments, outlining four critical priority areas for action: Monitoring air quality; assessing emissions and sources; expanding data access and use; and engaging governments and partners to develop and implement action plans.
The fastest path toward a future of prevention is government action to protect people from known risk factors. The cancer-fighting strategies above are proven protections that will work in both high- and low-income settings. This World Cancer Day, Vital Strategies encourages governments to put these actions on their agenda.
Additional Resources from Vital Strategies
- Fool Me Twice: This report offers evidence that the same unacceptable practices used by the tobacco industry are being employed by the food
and alcohol mega-industries and argues that governments should consider policies to curtail such influence on public health policy. Decades of tobacco control show the alternative is millions of preventable deaths.
- Fueling an Unhealthy Future: This brief calls on countries to reexamine current economic incentives to industries that harm health as an essential step towards creating coherent policies that sustain growth, support clean energy expansion and prevent noncommunicable diseases (NCDs).
- Media Beacon: Vital Strategies’ Media Beacon is a public health media resource to help governments and organizations improve the health and well-being of their people.
