Improved screening to lower cervical cancer rate

Deploying diagnostic tools that use artificial intelligence, strengthening grassroots doctors' screening capability and expanding free HPV vaccines are among the crucial steps China is taking to rein in the incidence of cervical cancer and reach goals set by the World Health Organization, health experts said recently.

China records more than 100,000 new cervical cancer cases and around 50,000 related deaths annually. The country also sees an incidence rate that is much higher than four per 100,000 — the threshold determined by the WHO as proof of elimination of the disease.

Qiao Youlin, a professor at the School of Population Medicine and Public Health at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, said that it usually takes about 10 years from becoming infected and exhibiting precancerous lesions to developing cervical cancer.