Global Champion for Cancer Care, actor Sanjay Dutt with Defeat-NCD Partnership at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research, is now in remission. He was diagnosed with advanced cancer in late 2020. In conversation with Dr. Sewanti Limaye, Dutt aims at better cancer awareness and treatment.
Upon the revelation of having cancer, the actor shares his first reaction was anger, Why me? From there on, he took every step of this journey with optimism and will to overcome, all that the doctor warned the actor for as post-treatment hassles, Sanjay Dutt made sure things didn’t come in his way of well-being.
The actor wanted to be on the ‘other side’ in the fight against the disease, although with 50-50 chances he took it head on. Despite the weakness, he went to the gym and other effects like hair loss were just little challenges for him. Labelling PET Scans as the scariest, fearing the results the actor had a hard time getting sleep. ‘I’ve done it’ was his reaction when his doctor signalled a thumbs up looking at the scan.
For better awareness, treatment and prevention Sanjay Dutt has pledged to use his reach as a celebrity and bring about the necessary changes. Now, having an oxygen level at an all time high 99% makes Sanjay Dutt the happiest as he speaks about it and his resolve to quit smoking and determination to steer clear through this storm makes him a champion.
Questioning the difference of gradation and pricing for medicines and treatment related resources, Sanjay urged to work as a team to make immunotherapy available for the needy and underprivileged. For ‘someone who needs it more than me’ drives him to team up with doctors and UN and as a team serve the purpose for fighters and survivors of this disease.
The actor is a face of the Cancer Awareness program under the Defeat-NCD Partnership at the UNITR. Through The Defeat-NCD Partnership to champion the work across 90 plus low resource countries and accelerate action towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3.4: to reduce by one-third premature mortality from non-communicable diseases through prevention and treatment and promote mental health and well-being by 2030.