THE prevalence of cancer in Wairarapa is worrying a senior Masterton pharmacist Heaton Haglund.
Mr Haglund said the incidence of cancer seems to be steadily increasing across all age groups and it's time a proper government-backed study was carried out to try to determine why this was so.
"I think a proper in-depth survey by a research team would come up with staggering results," he said.
"Everyone you speak to either knows someone who has cancer, or has had it."
At Glenwood Hospital in Masterton, in which he is a shareholder, the palliative care unit is always busy caring for cancer patients and a breast prostheses manufacturer supplying the greater Wellington market has told him that about 70 per cent of the products they manufacture are for Wairarapa people..
Mr Haglund said he has a theory as to why Wairarapa is such a cancer-stricken district.
"Some years ago when I was looking at cancer figures that concerned me I sat down and tried to work out why this should be such a problem in Wairarapa.
"I spoke to some close acquaintances who all came up with the same reasoning ? that it has a lot to do with agricultural or horticultural sprays.
"I have got to thinking that spraying has to have some effect, doubly so here because it has nowhere to go.
"We are a great, land-locked valley protected by the Tararua Ranges, the Rimutakas and the eastern hills, and the micro-fine spray particles settle.
"They might blow around a bit, but they don't blow away like they can in some other areas."
Mr Haglund said he realised that by voicing his theory he could be putting himself up to be criticised by growers and other spray users as being someone who has just dreamt up a reason.
"But there has to be a reason for the high cancer rates in our community."
He said medicine had made wonderful in-roads into the mortality rate and campaigns urging people to go to a doctor if they suspected a problem meant that early detection rates were getting better.
This, and the fact that in earlier times many cancers were explained away as " wasting diseases and consumption" probably meant cancer rates in days gone by were disguised.
He said while that is probably true, he is suspicious of the role spraying plays because of corresponding respiratory problems, particularly asthma.
Mr Haglund said he knows of a Wellington specialist working in radiology who is convinced that cancer rates in Wairarapa are well out of kilter and is "adamant" that widespread spray programmes are to blame.
About 10 years ago statistics on cluster cancers revealed that parts of Wairarapa were vulnerable, especially in the lower valley and Kahutara areas.
Concern at cancer rates
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