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Chewing Their Way to Misery

BY AWAKE! CORRESPONDENT IN INDIA

CATCHY jingles on the radio encourage people to use it. Film stars promote it in TV, magazines, and newspapers as leading to an exciting, prestigious way of life. But the small print warns that using the product could injure your health. What is it? An addictive and harmful substance known as pan.

Pan is used in Asia—very widely in India. In its traditional form, it consists of a mixture of crushed betel nut, tobacco, and other taste-enhancing ingredients. The tobacco and betel nut make the pan addictive. These are placed on a betel-pepper leaf that has been smeared with pastes of mineral lime and catechu, an astringent plant product. The leaf is folded to enclose the filling, and then the entire package is put into the mouth. A popular form is pan masala, the same ingredients mixed in dry form and packed in small sachets that can be carried easily and used at any time.

Chewing takes quite a while and produces large amounts of saliva, which have to be spit out at intervals. Most homes where pan is popular have a spittoon, but outside the home a footpath or a wall becomes a receptacle. This is the cause of the brownish-colored stains that can be seen on stairways and corridors of many buildings in India.

According to a Tata Institute of Fundamental Research study, 10 percent of India’s new cancer cases each year are oral cancer—about twice the world average. Dr. R. Gunaseelan, an oral and maxillofacial surgeon, joins surgeons all over India in laying the blame largely on the chewing of pan. He states in the Indian Express: “All forms of pan are harmful for the mouth.” He noted that pan “definitely can lead to oral cancer” and that “chewing it is like inviting facial deformities.” So, using pan could mean chewing one’s way to misery.

[Picture on page 31]

Ten percent of India’s new cancer cases are oral cancer

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WHO photo by Eric Schwab