Overview
- Observed on February 15, this year’s campaign adopted the theme “Demonstrating Impact,” with WHO citing about 400,000 new cases in children and adolescents each year.
- Doctors stress that most childhood cancers are highly curable with timely care, urging parents to act on red flags such as persistent fever, unexplained weight loss, painless lumps, easy bruising, bone or joint pain, and morning headaches with vomiting.
- UK advocates report long-term progress, noting that about 80% of children and young people now survive at least 10 years after a cancer diagnosis.
- India records nearly 50,000 paediatric cases annually (about 4% of national cancers); Jaipur clinicians report free-treatment projects including the Jeevandan programme, which has treated 286 children since 2014 with 178 declared cancer-free, alongside a Wilms’ tumour initiative with 21 recoveries.
- Pakistan sees roughly 10,000 paediatric diagnoses each year with survival under 30% due to late presentation, limited specialised facilities and costs; Indus Hospital provides free care, treats about 1,000 new cases annually, has managed 16,000+ since 2014, and has expanded a shared-care model that reached 414 patients in Sindh since 2023 and 1,030 in Quetta since 2021.