Avoid death from cancer

Germany

External stakeholder

Vision Zero e.V.

Disease / Indication

Cancer

Target Audience

Policymakers

Scientists

Visit the website

Vision Zero

Bringing the number of avoidable deaths from cancer down to close to zero: This is the aim of Vision Zero, a German cancer prevention initiative and think tank.

Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), it is responsible for nearly 10 million deaths each year. In Germany, around every fourth citizen dies from cancer.[1] That’s 600 people every day, 220,000 every year.[2] Many of these deaths could be avoided through better prevention and early detection, more precise diagnostics, the faster transfer of therapeutic innovations into practice and nationwide access to guideline-based and individually optimized care.

The goal of Vision Zero is to ensure that the potential of these approaches is fulfilled and to reduce the number of avoidable deaths from cancer significantly – ideally to zero.

“In my view, Vision Zero is absolutely worth supporting – also from my perspective, that of patient safety. Anything that ensures that patients receive the right therapy at the right time improves prognosis and tolerability. It therefore serves Vision Zero as well as safer care.”

Dr. Ruth Hecker, Board Member of Vision Zero and Chair of the German Coalition for Patient Safety (Aktionsbündnis Patientensicherheit, APS)

220,000

people in Germany die from cancer every year. That’s 600 people every day.[1]

40%

of all cancers could be avoided by a healthier lifestyle.[3]

1 Euro

per pack of cigarettes: Vision Zero proposes a tax on cigarettes (“prevention euro”) to fund measures to reduce cancer deaths.[4]

health.

The concept of Vision Zero is based on successful models that have been used to improve road safety. Over the past decades, the number of road deaths has been reduced significantly, even as traffic has greatly increased. Vision Zero believes that this achievement is also possible in oncology and that cancer does not have to be one of the main causes of death in the future.

heart.

Cancer patients have their own perspective on their disease and a different sense of what is important than that of physicians and therapists. Vision Zero promotes the stronger inclusion of these perspectives in research and in clinical practice and the recognition of soft factors such as quality of life, combining treatment and daily life, etc. as treatment goals. Patients and their self-help organizations should be better included in the process. Doctors should see people as equal partners in their treatment. Taking personal wishes into account is an important basis for successful treatment. Patients’ confidence and competence must be strengthened in the long term.

science.

Vision Zero sees itself as a think tank and wants to contribute to the substantial improvement of prevention and early detection, the sustainable promotion of precision diagnostics and innovative treatment concepts and the development of models for decision-makers in health policy.

https://vision-zero-oncology.de

Sources:

[1] WHO https://www.iarc.who.int/news-events/latest-global-cancer-data-cancer-burden-rises-to-19-3-million-new-cases-and-10-0-million-cancer-deaths-in-2020/

[2] Vision Zero https://vision-zero-oncology.de/index.php

[3] Vision Zero https://vision-zero-oncology.de/zehn-themenfelder-praevention

[4] Vision Zero https://vision-zero-oncology.de/zehn-themenfelder.php