India’s largest Cancer Institute, National Cancer Institute (NCI), has opened in Jhajjar district, Haryana for public services.

Facts :

• The National Cancer Institute has been established under a project of Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).
• The state-of-art cancer centre is a part of the AIIMS-II campus at Jhajjar, for which the Haryana government gave 300 acres of land to AIIMS. The NCI has come up in 35 acres.
• The institute has been modelled after United States’ National Cancer Institute (NCI). It is developed as the premier institute for all activities related to cancer in the country and will have the linkages with all regional cancer centres.
• It will collaborate with cancer institutes in the US, France and the UK.
• Finalised at a cost of Rs 2,035 crore, the project was approved by the cabinet committee on December 26, 2013, and the hospital’s foundation stone was laid on January 3, 2014.
• The HSCC (India) Ltd., a public sector enterprise under the administrative control of the health and family welfare ministry, has been appointed as project consultant by AIIMS.
• The National Cancer Institute (“independent India’s largest government-funded hospital” ) will be formally inaugurated in January 2019.
• Dr G.K. Rath, head of Institute Rotary Cancer hospital at All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi, will head the NCI.

About the National Cancer Institute:

• The NCI is built at a cost of Rs 2,035 crore. Presently, NCI has a total of 710 beds out of which 200 beds have been dedicated for the treatment of cancer patients based on research protocols.
• The National Cancer Institute (NCI) will act as the nodal institution for all cancer-related activities in India.
• It will be linked to regional cancer centres and other cancer institutes of India.
• The NCI will be the premier institute for cancer treatment and research. It is tasked to conduct basic and applied research in areas like molecular biology, genomics, proteomics, cancer epidemiology, radiation biology, cancer vaccines and more.
• It will work towards evolving new cancer control strategies, which include new models of prevention, early diagnosis and therapy, for the developing nations.
• Development of human resource in various branches of cancer management is another area where NCI will work.
• NCI will also have the facilities for training and capacity building in cancer treatment.
• The NCI will have equipment with advanced and latest technology to learn more about cancer.
• NCI will assist other regional cancer centres in research activities.
• The National Cancer Institute (NCI) will help to take off some patient load from AIIMS which presently receives about 1000 patients every day.
• Although the doctors have started OPDs in the NCI, the full functioning of all the departments of the National Cancer Institute will commence in January 2019.

Analysis :

• Cancer is the second biggest killer in India. The number of cases of this dreaded disease, studies show, has doubled from 5.5 lakh in 1990 to 10.6 lakh in 2016.
• A large number of people are falling prey to deadly diseases like cancer in Haryana, and the death toll is on the rise.Around 4,592 people died due to cancer in all 22 districts in 2017 with the highest of 771 deaths reported in Faridabad.
• Even after in last three years, a total of 12,091 deaths took place due to various forms of cancer in the state, the government seems to have no tool to address the situation.
• The next district to record the most number of deaths was Yamunanagar with 501, 440 in Jind and 354 in Rohtak. While Sonepat had 262 deaths in 2017, Narnaul recorded 217 cases, Rewari 197 and Gurugram 139 deaths last year.
• Interestingly, the most backward and remote district like Mewat has only 51 cases of cancer deaths while lowest recorded Panchkula with only five deaths.
• Haryana has no hospital specifically for cancer. Even, there is no ward in the state-run civil hospitals in any of the 22 districts. Developed district like Gurugram, which had a cancer ward in civil hospital till first half of last year, has been shut down since due to resignation of a cancer specialist.
• Haryana has topped the nationwide tally with 39.6 per cent cancer patients whereas the national Capital has 27.3 per cent and Uttar Pradesh has 12.7 per cent patients.
• The leading types of cancer in India 2016, as per a recent, among both sexes are stomach cancer (9%), breast cancer (8.2%), lung cancer (7.5%), lip and oral cavity cancer (7.2%), pharynx cancer other than nasopharynx (6.8%), colon and rectum cancer (5.8%), leukaemia (5.2%) and cervical cancer (5.2%).
• We don’t have enough India-specific research at the moment, especially with new cancer drugs coming almost every other day. We are blindly following the west, so this institute will help strengthen our research.
• There has been a lack of cancer treatment facilities in India, compared to WHO standards, which require one radiotherapy machine per million population. India, at present, has 0.41 machines per million population.The setting up of this institute will herald a new chapter in the government initiative against cancer,