Cervical Cancer, Oncologist Lorusso: “87% Deaths in Developing Countries”

Cervical cancer affects women of all backgrounds, but today there are many disparities in the approach to the disease based on ethnicity, income, country of residence and access to care. “85% of diagnoses and 87% of deaths from this cancer occur in developing countries. In low- and middle-income countries, in fact, they have neither screening nor vaccination, that is, they have neither primary prevention nor secondary prevention against this cancer” which is the fourth most frequent tumor in women worldwide, with about 2,500 diagnoses per year in Italy (but it could disappear thanks to the vaccine against Papillomavirus) and “the fourth cause of death from cancer in women between 35 and 54 years old”.

Domenica Lorusso, full professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Humanitas University and director of the Oncology Gynecology Program at Humanitas San Pio X in Milan, told Adnkronos Salute on the occasion of Esmo 2024, which is bringing together thousands of oncologists from all over the world in Barcelona these days. Lorusso is also principal investigator of the Keynote-A18 study, according to which over 8 out of 10 women with high-risk locally advanced cervical cancer survive 3 years after immunotherapy treatment with pembrolizumab, in combination with concomitant chemoradiotherapy. The work was presented today at the congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology.

“The 8% increase in survival means curing patients – he underlines – that is, here we are not talking about a postponement of relapse, which would be important anyway. In this setting we are talking about overall survival: it means curing a greater number of patients, it means that for every 10 patients we cure one more”, he concludes.