Weekly news - The rising tide of cancer / Uprisings in Bosnia

The week began with the sobering report from the World Health Organisation that global cancer cases are expected to soar by 70% over the next 20 years to 25 million new cases per annum.

More than perhaps anything else in modern life, the spectre of Cancer looms large and omniscient in the mass consciousness; an abominable evil that will almost certainly afflict everyone, whether personally or vicariously, at one or multiple points during their life.

The way it has assumed this pervasive aura of unbridled fear and loathing is, I think, a symptom of collective neurosis, previously assuaged by the Cold War-era threat of nuclear annihilation or, before that, the spread of fascism.

This is leant further psychic credence by the knowledge that cancer, in the same way as addiction, fails to discriminate; afflicting young and old, male and female, rich and poor, rendering its mitigation largely impossible. It also cannot lend nourishment to that other paranoid neurosis, the 'fear of the other', in the same way as contagions such as the plague or AIDs.

With the 20th century elevation of the medical profession to the stature of modern 'priesthood', cancer has come to represent that indomitable judgement wrought upon the congregation as penance for sins self-inflicted throughout life, symbolised now by lifestyle choices - whether you drink to excess, whether you smoke, whether you exercise, etc.

In an age where access to all and any informational knowledge is unlimited and the efficacy of science is unquestioned, the fact that a cure for cancer remains the 'great unknown' only adds to the potency of the fear it instills. Indeed, a cure for this shape-shifting affliction now assumes the form of a 'Holy Grail', the search for which is ultimately hopeless since the concept of a universal palliative is, if reports are to be believed, just as illusory.

The troubling statistic from this report needn't really be all that surprising. Firstly, there was a report recently from the Overseas Development Initiative (ODI), which stated that there are now almost twice as many obese people in poor countries as opposed to rich ones; confirming the assumption that a healthy (and therefore, hopefully cancer-free) life is far harder to sustain on a low income.

And secondly, it must also be seen in light of the many undeniable gains made in other medicinal fields in terms of treating and preventing diseases that years previously would have lain down the clammy hand of death way before cancer had a chance to unfold its languid arms.

The way I see it, cancer and its multiplicitous carcinogenic causes (of which the list appears to grow by the week), are to be viewed the same as any power body: hold them in suspicion until proven to be worthy of trust. Until something can be proven not to cause cancer, just assume that it does.

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As the protests in Ukraine inevitably fade from the news spotlight, this week violent uprisings were reported around Bosnia-Herzegovina to muted response.

In the central Bosnian city of Tuzla, some 5000 protesters stormed a local government building, whilst in Sarajevo (a city of particular historic significance this year), the presidency building was set alight.

Echoing the disaffection felt in Ukraine, Bosnians are incensed by the corruption, inefficiency and economic woes that have become intransigent since the signing of the Dayton Agreement in 1995 which heralded the end of the Bosnian War and was, at the time, championed by the US and others as a shining example of the virtue of international diplomacy (if only they could have learnt the lessons).

In 2014, the Bosnian middle class is said to have been decimated, unemployment is nearing 30%, and the political establishment is widely regarded as ruling in the exclusive interests of the elite few (sound familiar?)

It is news that went largely overlooked this week, and yet instead should be held up as a striking example of a disenfranchised collective taking to the streets and trying, whether it proves to be in vain or otherwise, to hold the political class to account, thereby giving them due cause to address their grievances.