In theory, international cancer organizations make sense as an advancement made in one place can be offered quickly to fellow cancer sufferers around the world. So the question is, how is this organization founded back in 1935 doing? So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
Despite the not great printing, I do like the image on this stamp. A Greek style hero in direct battle with a deadly beast. The Union for International Cancer Control is of course more about conferences and scientific publications, but it is good to remind attendees that there are people out there battling for their lives who need a hero. Notice the stamp is mostly in French despite being a New York United Nations issue. It was not until more than 10 years later that the Geneva offices of the UN began to offer separate issues.
Todays stamp is issue A110, a 13 cent stamp issued by the United Nations on May 22nd, 1970. It was a two stamp issue in conjunction with the then Union Against Cancer conference in Houston, Texas that year. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.
There was a first ad hoc conference of international cancer experts in Madrid in 1933. There it was suggested that the conferences become regular events. In 1935 in Paris an organization was formed under the Latin name Unio Internationales Contra Cancrum UICC, to provide for the conferences. The group had members both from governments and private cancer societies. In 1947, the organization moved to Geneva to work more closely with the World Health Organization.
As the conferences grew the UICC began to get involved in publishing with both a scientific journal and a frequently updated textbook on cancer diagnosis. There is a full time staff of about 50 in Geneva under a medical professor.
Above her there is a ceremonial head that is chosen by members to serve a two year term. Here is where there as been some backsliding. For the whole history of the UICC the President was a doctor or professor. Instead now we have Princess Consort Dina of Jordan as the President. She is not a doctor though she lead a pro cancer society in Jordan after losing her mother to cancer. Some may view this as breaking the glass ceiling that have kept down Muslim women who are also Princess Consorts, but it also displays going down the modern rabbit hole of virtue signaling celebrity over hard science. Sure enough her accomplishment was scheduling the next conference, now conference and expo, in the Middle East in that hotbed of cancer research that is Oman. Fate has stepped in and the Oman expo was cancelled due to the coronavirus.
Fear not, the UICC is still actively producing webinars on fighting cancer in the age of COVID. Subtitled no doubt, go home and die. If the UICC is going to stay with not science leaders, I propose the next one be the singer Bonnie Tyler. She understands Holding out for a hero as conveyed on the stamp.
Well my drink is empty. Come again soon for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2021.