Cancer in the Africans and Arabs of Zanzibar

Among 392 cancers histologically diagnosed in Zanzibar during 1957-62 and 1964-67, a definite pattern seems to emerge. Skin and cervix cancers were the most common types in both Africans and Arabs. Skin cancer was predominantly of the squamous cell type. The Zanzibar Arabsthus appear to be protected against basal cell carcinoma which in the Arab desert community has been diagnosed with about the same frequency as squamous-cell carcinoma. In the same manner, the Zanzibar Arab immigrants seem to have a reduced risk for stomach and oesophageal cancers, which are common in other Arab countries. This is probably because Arabs in Zanzibar have adopted the dietary habits and other customs of the Zanzibar Africans in whom cancer of the alimentary tract seems to be uncommon. On the other hand, unlike Zanzibar Africans, the Arabs have an increased risk for Hodgkin's disease similar to that of the Middle East Arab population.