Vinegar may be used to detect cervical cancer

A NON- PROFIT health organization on Friday said that it had started to use vinegar to detect cervical cancer among Filipino women.

During an interview with reporters during the celebration of World Cancer Day, Dr. Enriquito Lu, the technical director of Johns Hopkins University-affiliated Jphiego, said that cervical cancer could be prevented by using earlydetection methods such as the so-called vinegar procedure,

also known as the visual inspection of acetic acid.

“Vinegar may be more useful than they [ people] know. It can now [ be used] to detect cervical cancer . . . It is much cheaper than a pap smear,” he added.

Cervical cancer is the second cause of death among women in the Philippines, the doctor said.

A pap smear is a modern—and expensive—screening method for cervical cancer.

According to 2010 data from the Department of Health, the prevalence rate for cervical cancer was 11.7 percent in a population of 100,000, which translates to 12 women dying of this particular disease every day.

“Cervical cancer is the most preventable cancer in the world,” Lu said.

Early diagnosis of cancer and vaccination are needed to combat this disease, he added.

“This [ vinegar procedure] is a life- saving procedure for many women in developing regions of the world now,” the doctor said.

He added that there were now 10 pilot sites around the country that provide visual inspection of acetic acid.

According to Lu, women could get cervical cancer from exposure to the human papilloma virus (HPV) through sexual contact and it usually takes 15 years to 20 years before it reaches the invasive level.

“We are encouraging all women age 25 and above to go to the community health clinic and undergo a visual inspection of acetic acid,” he said.

This procedure, which started in Thailand in 1990, is a testing procedure for cervical cancer that is recognized by the World Health Organization, the doctor added.

Lu said that the vinegar procedure could be done only by trained nurses and midwives by applying diluted vinegar to the cervix.

He added that if the abnormal tissue turned white when exposed to vinegar, the patient has cancer.