The topic that I am about to share is on Poverty and Cancer Awareness. Cancer is one of most deadly diseases in the world. The eradication of Poverty is not fully completed yet in countries such as India, certain parts of China and in the African region. How do we eradicate poverty? Are we doing enough? We hear of a lot of cancer cases around the world whether it is Breast Cancer or Lung Cancer or Prostrate Cancer or Cancer in the Bladder. Let's join in support of the Pink Ribbon.
Poverty
While I was at Jakarta, I can see people including children selling things on the street during traffic jams and once even in the rain. They are very poor and goes all the way to get some money even endangering themselves on the road. Some of them played music to entertain instead of selling. Things that they sell include tissue papers, Danone AQUA mineral waters, lifejackets, decoration horses, atlas and a monkey. Really, a monkey. Saw it on the road. It really depends on the drivers whether they are kind enough to give. In Africa or India, we heard stories about malaria and child beggars. We also heard about malnutrition for kids and some of them did not survive. They do not hygenic water too. No source of income. In some extremes, parents even sell their children for child labour or prostitution just to get money.
How do we fight poverty? By donations? Are the donations distributed and channeled to them evenly? There are a few ways to do that. These are my suggestions only. It may not be the best solutions.
- Financial aid - Clothing, medical supplies, clean water, infrastructure for education, electricity, technology
- Education - Enables the children to study further their studies at university. Then they are able to find a job and support their family back in their home countries. It also helps to raise the awareness on AIDS. Some of them married and have unlawful relationships young.
- Community Centres - Music, sewing & cooking workshops, handicrafts - they can then sell the handicrafts as tourist items and earn an income. The same goes for food where they can sell it at offices canteens if permissible
- Infrastructure - Electricity, clean water, technology. These need to be provided as well to them. It will reduce the cases of malaria and malnutrition in children and thus reduces the death rates in these countries. It also helps the children's education as well so that they can have a comfortable environment and the resources needed
- Free or low cost medicines - For example, CBMI (Christian Blind Mission International) provides free and low cost treatments to heal the poor's sight and provide medical facilities. Doctors & nurses can volunteer themselves to heal and treat patients. These may include part time Christian missionaries who are in the medical background
- Yearly supplement from the government to cover their costs
- Sponsor a child through World Vision or church initiatives
Here are some other sites on Poverty in the world including World Vision:
Make Poverty History (Not in Malaysia, One of my Causes in Facebook)
White Band (Not in Malaysia, associated with Make Poverty History)
One (Through Superpoke in Facebook)
This is a banner for eradicating poverty. Got this through the White Band website.
Cancer
Here are some information sheets on the various types of cancer provided by National Cancer Society of Malaysia, Cancer Council Victoria, Cancer Council Australia and National Cancer Institute (US). Just click the links below to go the respective websites.
Cancer Council Victoria & National Cancer Institute provides full information about all the types of cancer. Makna only has information for the four most common cancers in Malaysia which include Lung, Breast, Leukemia and Cervix Cancer. National Cancer Society of Malaysia and Cancer Council Australia have more information about cancers than Makna.
Cancer can strike anytime regardless of age. Children can suffer leukemia. People who has no history of smoking or hereditary patterns or live healthily can have cancer. It is better to detect cancer early because there is a higher percentage for the patients to be healed in early stages. Cancer cells at the last stage for example in Stage 4 can attack the patients' cell rapidly. It can spread to the whole body. My auntie passed away from Stage 4 Breast Cancer last year. I could see that she was having a hard time at the hospital. Struggling to breathe. Sometimes she can breathe better but most of the time she was breathless and very tired. Very sad to see her like that. She still remained strong and calm toward her last days. She relied on God's strength to carry her through and she is now in heaven with God.
I watched Journey of Life, a programme shown on Channel News Asia last week. It talked about 2 cancer patients who survived. One of them, a Chinese was in Stage 4 Breast Cancer. She doesn't drink, she exercised regualarly and she does not smoke. Yet, she got a Stage 4 Breast Cancer. There was a fear that she felt when she was going through cancer but she still remained strong. For her cancer, chemotherapy worked her. Everytime she went for chemotherapy, the cancer cells are killed. Now, she needs to wear a tube which injects chemo into her body everyday so that the cancer cells can be killed. Different cancer patients also react to different methods of treatment. Some may not react to chemotherapy as well as her. She now lives her life normally as she used to be. The other lady shown is a Malay who had a Stage 1 cancer. She got it detected early. Her treatment worked her but there are also side effects. She could not lift up heavy things now. She needs to be very careful with her movement.
Cancer can be caused by various things such as diet, smoking, obesity or family history or sometimes it can attack anyone healthy. We need to take care of our bodies to prevent and reduce the chances of having cancer. By having a balanced diet and eating healthily everyday, we can reduce the probability of having cancer. Fruits and vegetables can help to combat cancer too. These include fruit and vegetable juices as well. Please do not smoke too. It will increase the probability of lung cancer later. Exercise regularly is good too to reduce the chances of contracting cancer. These things can help but different people will have different reactions to it. It really depends on the individual. It is a very serious disease and cancer patients have to go through a lot of suffering.
Below are some of the ways found on the websites that can prevent cancers. These may be useful:
Hopefully, it will be prevented. Let us help and eradicate poverty too.
That's all for now. I may continue writing about it in the next few weeks. Not sure yet.
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