Some statements about cancer are widely believed and are not supported by the evidence. A few of them change whether a person goes to a health worker, or how long they wait. This page states each claim plainly, then sets out what the published sources establish.
Key facts
- Ethiopian research has documented several of these beliefs directly. Each section below says which study recorded the claim, in which population and in which year.
- One study followed 441 women newly diagnosed with breast cancer in Addis Ababa. Among those who used traditional medicine before seeing a clinician (opens in a new tab), waits of more than 90 days from first symptom to first consultation were more than twice as common.
- Pre-cancerous change on the cervix rarely causes symptoms (opens in a new tab) and usually precedes cancer by 15 to 20 years. That interval is what a screening test is for.
- An IARC classification states how certain the evidence is that an agent causes cancer, not how large the risk is (opens in a new tab). Two agents in the same group can carry very different risks.
- These Ethiopian studies describe people who reached a hospital in one city. They are case series, not measurements of the whole population.
The claim: a woman who feels well has no reason to be screened
What the evidence shows. Screening exists because the change it looks for produces nothing a woman would notice. Abnormal cells on the cervix rarely cause symptoms. The interval before they become cancer is usually 15 to 20 years. It is 5 to 10 years in a woman whose HIV is untreated. A woman who feels entirely well is the person screening was designed for.
The distinction runs the other way too. A change someone has noticed is a reason to be assessed now, not to wait for a screening round.
Where the claim is recorded. A 2022 study in Southern Ethiopia asked 42 people. It used five focus groups with women and six interviews with health workers. It found that the perceived benefit of screening during healthy periods was low (Ayanto and colleagues, 2023 (opens in a new tab)).
What to do. Ask at your health facility whether cervical screening is offered there, and which test is used.
The claim: try traditional treatment first, and go to a hospital if it does not work
What the evidence shows. Two studies measured what this costs. Both describe the same 441 women, newly diagnosed with breast cancer in seven Addis Ababa facilities between January 2017 and June 2018.
Some of these women used traditional medicine before seeing a clinician. Among them, waits of more than 90 days from first symptom to first consultation were more than twice as common (Gebremariam and colleagues, 2019 (opens in a new tab)). Diagnosis at an advanced stage was also more common in that group (Gebremariam and colleagues, 2020 (opens in a new tab)). Across the whole cohort, 64% were diagnosed at stage III or IV.
These are figures for women who reached a hospital in one city. They are not a measurement of the whole country.
What to do. A change you have noticed is a reason to see a health worker now. Nothing on this site asks anyone to give up their faith or their community. It asks that a lump is looked at while it is small.
The claim: cervical cancer follows from a woman’s own behaviour, or from breaking a taboo
What the evidence shows. Persistent infection with high-risk types of human papillomavirus causes about 95% of cervical cancers, on WHO’s cervical cancer fact sheet. HPV is a common virus. Most people who have sex will be infected at some point, and in most the infection clears without treatment.
Where the claim is recorded. Focus groups were held with men, women and community leaders in Jimma Zone and Addis Ababa. Participants thought the cause of cervical cancer was a breach of social taboos, or unacceptable behaviour. The same study recorded women with cervical cancer being excluded from their communities and receiving poor emotional support (Birhanu and colleagues, 2012 (opens in a new tab)).
What to do. Treat a diagnosis as a medical event. On this site, late presentation is a finding about the health system, not a judgement about a person.
The claim: a woman who has had the HPV vaccine does not need screening
What the evidence shows. The vaccine prevents infection and cannot clear one already present. That is why it is given before sexual activity begins.
The types it targets, 16 and 18, account for most cervical cancer but not all of it. WHO’s cervical cancer fact sheet, revised in July 2026, puts their share at around 76%. Its undated immunisation programme page puts it at around 70%. Both figures are published and neither is adopted here.
What to do. A woman vaccinated at 9 still has a reason to be screened at 30.
The claim: one dose of the HPV vaccine cannot be enough
What the evidence shows. WHO recommends a one- or two-dose schedule for girls aged 9 to 14. Ethiopia moved to a single dose in March 2024. By the end of 2025, 93 countries were using a single-dose schedule (opens in a new tab). More than 85% of girls aged 9–14 vaccinated that year received one.
Girls known to be immunocompromised or living with HIV are the exception. They need at least two doses, and three where feasible.
The claim: nine is too young
What the evidence shows. Protection has to be in place before exposure, because the vaccine works against infection rather than against one already established. The March 2023 report of the ICO/IARC HPV Information Centre gives a median age at first sexual intercourse for Ethiopian women. It ranges across surveys from 15.6 to 18.8 years.
The claim: two things in the same IARC group are equally dangerous
What the evidence shows. IARC places each agent it evaluates in a category. The category records how strong the evidence is that the agent causes cancer in people. It does not record how large the risk is. At the July 2026 update, 135 agents sat in the top category. Two agents in the same group can differ greatly in the risk they carry. No comparison between members of a group follows from their sharing it.
The claim: cancer is contagious
What the evidence shows. Several viruses and one bacterium are established causes of cancer at specific sites. They are HPV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, HIV, Epstein–Barr virus, Kaposi sarcoma herpesvirus and Helicobacter pylori. Each of them passes between people. The cancer develops years or decades later, in the person who was infected.
So the infection can be passed on. The cancer that may follow it develops in one person’s own body.
What to do. Two of those infections have vaccines in Ethiopia’s schedule, against hepatitis B and HPV. Infections sets out both.
The claim: alcohol in moderation carries no cancer risk
What the evidence shows. Both halves of WHO’s position are on the record. Its 2024 fact sheet states that there is “no form of alcohol consumption that is risk-free” (opens in a new tab). The same document states that most alcohol-related harm comes from heavy episodic or heavy continuous drinking. Alcoholic drinks carry sufficient evidence of causing cancer at eight sites, breast among them.
What to do. Cutting heavy drinking occasions is the change those two statements together point to.
The claim: eat and exercise the way prevention advice says, and cancer is prevented
What the evidence shows. Roughly 38% of cancers worldwide (opens in a new tab) could be prevented by acting on risk factors already identified. WHO gives that figure on its July 2026 fact sheet. The rest are not preventable by any means those sources describe.
Ethiopia’s own exposure figures also differ from the ones that advice was written against. Adult obesity was 2.9% in 2024, against a global 16% in the same year. Physical inactivity was 9.4% in 2022, against a global 31% in the same year. Those four figures are from WHO: indicators NCD_BMI_30A and NCD_PAA in the Global Health Observatory, and its obesity fact sheet of October 2026 for the global obesity share. Mean adult body mass index was 20.4 in Ethiopia’s 2015 national risk-factor (STEPS) survey, near the lower end of the normal band. In the same survey, more than 98% of Ethiopians were eating fewer than five servings of fruit and vegetables a day.
The cancer prevention recommendations published by the World Cancer Research Fund (opens in a new tab) cover diet, weight and physical activity. They contain no infection component. The causes with Ethiopian figures attached here are infections: hepatitis B, HPV and H. pylori.
What this means in Ethiopia
Two points on this page are disagreements between sources rather than corrections, and they are published as disagreements. One is WHO’s two figures for the share of cervical cancer caused by types 16 and 18. The other is the two records of whether the country has a population-based cancer registry, set out on cancer in Ethiopia.
The Ethiopian studies cited here describe people who reached a hospital in Addis Ababa or took part in focus groups in two areas. They record that a belief was held by those participants. They do not measure how widely it is held across the country.
What you can do
- Ask what the source of a statement is, and for which year and which population. A figure without a year or a country behind it cannot be checked.
- If you have been vaccinated against HPV, plan on being screened as well. The two do different things.
- If someone is using traditional treatment for a lump, ask them to have it looked at as well, not instead. The Addis Ababa studies measured the cost of waiting.
- Do not change a child’s or a pregnant woman’s diet on cancer-prevention grounds. Weight and physical activity and food and alcohol set out why advice written elsewhere does not transfer.
- Take a change you have noticed to a health worker. No statement on this page substitutes for being assessed.