Cancer is an awful illness that affects so many people around the world. Nowadays it would be hard to find a person who didn’t know somebody who has been affected by the disease. They say that like most illnesses, the earlier cancer is detected the more treatable it can be but is it possible to still live a relatively normal life when you have cancer?

In this documentary Ruth Buchanan talks to both patients and cancer experts and looks at the different ways in which cancer can be controlled. She also talks to some cancer patients and are able to live with this illness with the help of the modern techniques of cancer management.

 At the time this documentary was made, Ireland was ranked at number eleven in a league table of forty countries, examined for death rates from cervical and breast cancer. This is another aspect of the disease that Ruth examines in this programme. 

Presented by Ruth Buchanan.

Produced by Padraic Dolan.

First broadcast: May 1976

An Irish radio documentary from RTÉ Radio 1, Ireland - Documentary on One - the home of Irish radio documentaries