Awareness of the mythical causes of cancer in central Uganda: a community cross-sectional survey
Nicholas Matovu, Helen G. Coleman, Gerald Mutungi, Michael Donnelly, Brian T. Johnston, Maurice B. Loughrey, Alfred Jatho, Noleb M. Mugisha, Charlene M. McShane · 2026
Read Awareness of the mythical causes of cancer in central Uganda: a community cross-sectional survey by Nicholas Matovu, Helen G. Coleman, Gerald Mutungi, Michael Donnelly, Brian T. Johnston, Maurice B. Loughrey, Alfred Jatho, Noleb M. Mugisha, Charlene M. McShane (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/pmc-13569581.txt.
Description
Nicholas Matovu and co-authors survey awareness of mythical causes of cancer among adults in central Uganda, published in 2026. False beliefs about what causes cancer can undermine prevention, yet they are poorly studied in Africa. The team used a validated scale adapted to measure mythical causes, in a community survey with multistage random sampling.
Good awareness was defined as correctly identifying at least half of the twenty mythical items as not causes. Awareness was extremely low: very few participants reached that bar, and the average score was a small fraction of the total. The most widely endorsed myth was that eating food cooked in a polythene bag causes cancer. Lower awareness tracked with older age, being married, and lower education. Having a relative with cancer was linked to better recognition of the myths.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Nicholas Matovu, Helen G. Coleman, Gerald Mutungi, Michael Donnelly, Brian T. Johnston, Maurice B. Loughrey, Alfred Jatho, Noleb M. Mugisha, Charlene M. McShane |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 27 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |