Lung cancer is a disease of uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung.
This growth may lead to metastasis, which is the invasion of adjacent tissue and infiltration beyond the lung. The vast majority of primary lung cancers are carcinomas of the lung, derived from epithelial cells. Lung cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer-related deaths. The most common symptoms are shortness of breath, coughing (including coughing up blood), and weight loss.
The main types of lung cancer are small cell lung carcinoma and non-small cell lung carcinoma. The most common cause of lung cancer is long-term exposure to tobacco smoke. In some cases, it is attributed to a combination of genetic factors, air pollution, including second hand smoke. Doctors claim that depending on the stage and treatment, the five-year survival rate is 14 percent.
Although the family members and the doctors said that they tried to keep this fact away from him, his close aides said that Koirala learnt of his ailment soon after he returned from Singapore. It was said that GPK suffered from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), bronchitis and emphysema -- a pair of two commonly co-exiting diseases. But doctors now admit that COPD could have been controlled and COPD does not lead to quick death. He was told that there was a tumor in one of the lungs.
However, GPK was not the first in the family to die of cancer. His brother Bishweshwar Prasad Koirala died of throat cancer in 1982. BP’s wife, Sushila, too suffered and ultimately succumbed to cancer.
Likewise, GPK’s other two brothers -- Matrika Prasad Koirala and Keshav Prasad Koirala – died of cancers. While cancer was diagnosed in Keshav Koirala, the diagnosis was not complete in case of Matrika Prasad Koirala.
“In retrospect, we think he, too, died of cancer,” said a family member.
There are indications that even GPK’s father, Krishna Prasad Koirala, died of this life threatening illness. Although it has never been written clearly of the main cause behind his death, in BP’s ‘Aafno Katha’, reference has been made of ‘patch in his lung,’ and KPK having ‘weak lungs’ before he was released from the jail.
In a letter written by Keshav Koirala to BP after the death of KPK, it is said that KPK was handed over to the family after his condition deteriorated in the prison. ‘His heart was weak, kidneys had failed, lunge had a pneumonia patch, and there swelling of the body,” Keshav wrote in the letter to BP.
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