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India's 'Cancer Train'
It's a 10-hour ride from a district in Punjab with a high prevalence of the disease blamed on excessive use of pesticides to a charity cancer hospital in neighbouring Rajasthan.
A study released last year, backed by the government pollution control body, found 103 people with cancer in a sample of 100,000 in one area of Bathinda region compared to 71 in an area nearby with lower pesticide contamination.
New Delhi's Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) found unacceptably high quantities of pesticides in blood samples from across the cotton-growing district.
The presence of the chemical lindane -- a "possible cancer-causing substance" used in pesticides and insecticides and banned in several countries -- was found to be 605 times higher in Bathinda than in the United States.
Both studies called for the regulation of pesticide use and pointed out a dire need for further research. There are no national figures for cancer prevalence in India.
"The situation is absolutely frightening. And it's not just cancer that people are suffering from," said scientist S.G. Kabra, who is leading a study on the effect of pesticides.
Local doctors say kidney problems, skin infections, heart attacks, birth defects, premature greying of children's hair and reproductive disorders have shot up dramatically since the mid-1990s.
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