Why India Struggles to Screen for Lung Cancer, Its Deadliest Malignancy

Gist Lung cancer has emerged as the leading cause of cancer-related mortality in India, yet it remains completely excluded from the government's primary healthcare screening programme. The lack of a national screening protocol using specialized scans results in the vast majority of cases being diagnosed at advanced, untreatable stages. For civil services aspirants, this highlights critical gaps in India's preventive healthcare infrastructure and the urgent need to adapt Western medical guidelines to Indian demographic realities, such as high air pollution and beedi smoking. Background The government’s current public health framework mandates cancer screening at Primary Health Centres PHCs for only three common malignancies: breast, oral, and cervical cancers. These protocols rely on inexpensive, low-technology visual or physical examinations such as visual inspection with acetic acid for cervical cancer . Lung cancer screening, however, requires Low-Dose Computed Tomography LDCT , a specialized radiological scan that detects malignant lung nodules early but requires expensive machinery unavailable at the primary care level. Consequently, lung cancer is typically diagnosed only when a patient presents with severe symptoms, by which point the disease has usually…