This is the main thrust of the Cervical Cancer Prevention Network Program (CECAP) led by Dr. Cecilia Llave, chairperson of UP PGH Cancer Institute, who serves as the programme director of the organization. The organization’s aim is to raise awareness about cervical cancer, and to empower women with information on how they can protect themselves from this disease.

Unknown to most of us, cervical cancer is the second most common cancer among women, after breast cancer. It is, however, the more fatal between the two. For every four women who survive breast cancer, only two or three are able to come through with cervical cancer. Every eight minutes, a woman dies from this disease. In the country, the rate of incidence and mortality has remained high for the past 30 years. However, since majority of the incidences in the rural areas have not been documented, the estimated numbers cannot be considered representative of what’s happening to the whole nation. For all we know, there are more cases that remain undiagnosed, and still more can occur because of lack of information about the disease.

CECAP aims to change just that. Because not many are aware about cervical cancer, they do not know that it is highly preventable.

What exactly causes cervical cancer? People mostly assume that just like breast cancer, it is hereditary. It is, however, caused by the Human Papillomavirus (HPV), most commonly HPV 16 and 18, and in some cases 31 and 45. Contrary to popular belief that it is the disease of the sexually promiscuous, Dr. Jovelle Fernandez, head of the Global Clinical Research and Development in Asia Pacific among other countries, emphasizes that all women are at risk. A woman may get the HPV from her first sexual encounter and develop what could potentially be a cancerous lesion from there. It has also been estimated that at least 80% of women will acquire a genital HPV in their lifetime, which may or may not lead to cervical cancer.

Since the cervix does not have nerve endings, a woman may have pre-cancerous lesions or cervical cancer in its early stages and feel no symptoms. This is why two thirds of the women diagnosed with the disease come in when the cancer is already in its advanced stages.

But because cervical cancer takes 10 to 30 years to be fully malignant, a woman can still take preventive measures to stop any pre-cancerous lesions from doing any damage.

A woman can start protecting herself from the disease through a healthy lifestyle. Daily exercise, a good night’s sleep, and proper nourishment can go a long way. And now, thanks to advanced studies, a vaccine protecting one from cervical cancer is now available through GlaxoSmithKline. The largest clinical trial for the cervical cancer vaccine, involving more than 18,000 women from 14 different countries, has confirmed that the vaccine gives 100% protection for women with ages from 15-25 for at least 6.4 years, and for 24 months for those 26 to 55 years of age.

Since the vaccine is prophylactic and not found to be therapeutic, women who have HPV infections prior to being vaccinated will not be cured. The vaccine, however, freezes up the HPV so that it will not infect the entire cervix.

Vaccination in itself is not a stand-alone approach to preventing cervical cancer, Dr. Sarah Tan, coordinator of the Cancer Institute Foundation, points out. Women are highly advised to go for screening in order to detect their susceptibility to the disease.

For the screening, the Pap smear has always been reliable. But because its results take a long time to come out, some women do not even follow up on their Pap smears, according to Dr. Jaycee Almaria, training coordinator for CECAP. Moreover, the underprivileged rarely get the chance to have this procedure done because it’s too expensive, and more often than not, their local health centers do not carry the necessary equipment for it.

Through the efforts of the Philippine Department of Health (DOH) and the University of the Philippines (UP), the visual inspection with acetic acid (VIA) was found to be the most cost-effective among the available alternative screening tests. Several studies in recent years have also demonstrated its effectiveness as an alternative to the Pap smear, among them the joint study conducted by JHPIEGO, an affiliate of the John Hopkins University, and the University of Zimbabwe. In 2006, the DOH-UP endorsed the VIA as the primary screening test for anti-cervical screening in the Philippines.

How exactly does the VIA work? As demonstrated by Dr. Almaria, the initial procedures of the Pap smear and the VIA are the same, only instead of obtaining samples from the vagina, the VIA requires dilute (3-5%) acetic acid or vinegar to be applied to the cervix. After a minute, the acetic acid will emphasize the lesions with a whitish hue.

Because the VIA can show whether a patient has pre-cancerous lesions immediately, the only thing to do is to treat the lesions right away before they get any worse. This is why the JHPIEGO, with the cooperation of the UP-PGH Cancer Institute, is helping the country in implementing the Single Visit Approach (SVA), wherein women can be screened through the VIA, and if found to have pre-cancerous lesions, can be directly treated in the health center with cryotherapy.

Cryotherapy is a safe procedure that can cure pre-cancerous lesions without the use of anesthesia or electricity. What makes it a perfect partner for the VIA is that it can be performed by trained health service providers, physicians or not. Though it has minimal side effects such as mild bleeding and cramping pain, the procedure is 85-95% effective.

Nowadays, CECAP is working towards training barangay health workers (BHWs) to raise cervical cancer awareness among Filipino women in the rural and underprivileged communities. Local BHWs can motivate women to go for screening using the VIA and avail themselves of treatment. CECAP aims to reach the far-flung areas to equip health service providers with knowledge and practical training as a step to eradicate cervical cancer. Capacity building has been piloted in areas such as Taytay, Rizal, Muntinlupa and Cebu.

Bravehearts, dubbed as "a multidisciplinary crusade for cervical cancer prevention with a social and moral responsibility to provide access to evidence-based information," was launched in late 2007, along with the CECAP Journal Club series, and websites such as the cancerinstitute.org, cifphil.org, and cecaphil.org, in an effort to make more women aware of this silent killer disease.