International

Scientists discover how air pollution triggers lung cancer

AFP | by Daniel Lawler and Isabelle Cortes

Scientists said Saturday they had identified the mechanism through which air pollution triggers lung cancer in non-smokers, a discovery one expert hailed as “an important step for science — and for society”.

The research illustrated the health risk posed by the tiny particles produced by burning fossil fuels, sparking fresh calls for more urgent action to combat climate change.

It could also pave the way for a new field of cancer prevention, according to Charles Swanton of the UK’s Francis Crick Institute.

Swanton presented the research, which has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal, at the European Society for Medical Oncology’s annual conference in Paris.

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Air pollution has long been thought to be linked to a higher risk of lung cancer in people who have never smoked.

“But we didn’t really know whether pollution was directly causing lung cancer — or how,” Swanton told AFP.

Traditionally it has been thought that exposure to carcinogens, such as those in cigarette smoke or pollution, causes DNA mutations that then become cancer.

But there was an “inconvenient truth” with this model, Swanton said: previous research has shown that the DNA mutations can be present without causing cancer — and that most environmental carcinogens do not cause the mutations.

His study proposes a different model.

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A future cancer pill?

The research team from the Francis Crick Institute and University College London analysed the health data of more than 460,000 people in England, South Korea and Taiwan.

They found that exposure to tiny PM2.5 pollution particles — which are less than 2.5 microns across — led to an increased risk of mutations in the EGFR gene.

In laboratory studies on mice, the team showed that the particles caused changes in the EGFR gene as well as in the KRAS gene, both of which have been linked to lung cancer.

Finally, they analysed nearly 250 samples of human lung tissue never exposed to carcinogens from smoking or heavy pollution.

Even though the lungs were healthy, they found DNA mutations in 18 percent of EGFR genes and 33 percent of KRAS genes.

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“They’re just sitting there,” Swanton said, adding that the mutations seem to increase with age.

“On their own, they probably are insufficient to drive cancer,” he said.

But when a cell is exposed to pollution it can trigger a “wound-healing response” that causes inflammation, Swanton said.

And if that cell “harbours a mutation, it will then form a cancer”, he added.

“We’ve provided a biological mechanism behind what was previously an enigma,” he said.

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In another experiment on mice, the researchers showed that an antibody could block the mediator — called interleukin 1 beta — which sparks the inflammation, stopping cancer from getting started in the first place.

Swanton said he hoped the finding would “provide fruitful grounds for a future of what might be molecular cancer prevention, where we can offer people a pill, perhaps every day, to reduce the risk of cancer”.

Revolutionary

Suzette Delaloge, who heads the cancer prevention programme at France’s Gustave Roussy institute, said the research was “quite revolutionary, because we had practically no prior demonstration of this alternative way of cancer forming.

“The study is quite an important step for science — and for society too, I hope,” she told AFP.

“This opens a huge door, both for knowledge but also for new ways to prevent” cancer from developing, said Delaloge, who was not involved in the research but discussed it at the conference on Saturday.

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“This level of demonstration must force authorities to act on an international scale.”

Tony Mok, an oncologist at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, called the research “exciting”.

“It means that we can ask whether, in the future, it will be possible to use lung scans to look for pre-cancerous lesions in the lungs and try to reverse them with medicines such as interleukin 1 beta inhibitors,” he said.

Swanton called air pollution a “hidden killer”, pointing to research estimating it is linked to the deaths of more than eight million people a year — around the same number as tobacco.

Other research has linked PM2.5 to 250,000 deaths annually from lung cancer alone.

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“You and I have a choice about whether we smoke or not, but we do not have a choice about the air we breathe,” said Swanton, who is also the chief clinician at Cancer Research UK, which was the main funder of the research.

“Given that probably five times as many people are exposed to unhealthy levels of pollution than tobacco, you can see this is quite a major global problem,” he added.

“We can only tackle it if we recognise the really intimate links between climate health and human health.”

International

Peruvian presidential candidate Napoleón Becerra dies in campaign road accident

Presidential candidate Napoleón Becerra, representing the Partido de los Trabajadores y Emprendedores (PTE) in Peru, died in a traffic accident while traveling to a campaign event, local authorities confirmed Sunday.

Becerra, who also served as president of the centrist political party, ranked among the lowest in opinion polls in a crowded field of more than 30 candidates competing in the presidential election scheduled for April 12.

Recent surveys place Rafael López Aliaga at the top of voter preferences.

The accident occurred near the town of Ayacucho, in southern Peru, when the vehicle carrying the candidate overturned for reasons that remain under investigation.

“The candidate Becerra has died,” Balvin Huamani, mayor of the district of Pilpichaca, told RPP radio.

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According to Huamani, he personally transported the 61-year-old candidate to a local health center, where doctors confirmed his death.

The Jurado Nacional de Elecciones (JNE) expressed condolences over Becerra’s passing and wished a speedy recovery to the three people who were traveling with him and were injured in the crash.

International

Noboa intensifies anti-cartel crackdown as violence persists in Ecuador

A close ally of Washington, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa has pursued a hardline security strategy against cocaine cartels for more than two years, yet homicide, disappearance and extortion rates remain high across the country.

Between Sunday night and the morning of March 31, Ecuador’s armed forces will launch a “very strong offensive” with “advisory support” from the United States, Interior Minister John Reimberg announced Tuesday.

The government has kept details of the operation confidential and has not confirmed whether U.S. troops will be deployed on Ecuadorian soil, as has occurred at times during Noboa’s administration.

As part of the security measures, residents in the coastal provinces of Guayas, Los Ríos, Santo Domingo de los Tsáchilas, and El Oro will be subject to a nightly curfew from 11:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. local time for the next two weeks.

“We are in a war,” Reimberg said, urging citizens to remain indoors. “Do not take risks. Stay home and allow the security forces and our allies to do the work that must be done.”

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Although Ecuador does not produce cocaine, it has become a major departure point for drugs heading to the United States. Meanwhile, the violence associated with trafficking has increasingly affected the local population.

Bordering the world’s largest cocaine producers, Colombia and Peru, Ecuador has gone from being considered a relatively peaceful country to recording one of the highest homicide rates in Latin America—52 killings per 100,000 inhabitants—according to the **Observatory of Organized Crime.

International

Peruvian presidential candidate proposes death penalty amid crime surge

Peru is facing an unprecedented surge in crime ahead of its presidential election scheduled for April 12, with violence fueled by extortion networks and a wave of contract killings linked to organized crime.

Police data show that 2,200 homicides tied to organized crime were recorded in 2025, while extortion complaints increased by 19%, underscoring the growing security crisis in the South American nation.

Amid this backdrop, presidential candidate Álvarez has proposed reinstating the death penalty if elected, arguing that extreme measures are needed to curb the violence.

To implement the proposal, Álvarez said Peru would withdraw from the American Convention on Human Rights—also known as the Pact of San José—which the country signed in 1978. The agreement prevents member states that have abolished capital punishment from reinstating it.

Currently, Peruvian law only allows the death penalty in cases of treason during wartime.

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“We have to leave the Pact of San José and apply the death penalty in Peru because those miserable criminals don’t deserve to live,” Álvarez told AFP during a campaign stop at a market in Callao, the port city neighboring Lima.

“An iron fist against those criminals,” he added, proposing to declare hitmen as military targets.

During the campaign event, Álvarez walked through stalls selling vegetables, groceries, and fish, greeting vendors while musicians played cumbia music nearby.

The 62-year-old candidate, who spent more than four decades working in television as a comedian, is a newcomer to politics and is running for president under the País para Todos party.

Polls place him fifth in voter preference with nearly 4% support in a fragmented race featuring 36 candidates.