This World Cancer Day, let's also remember the ‘cancer warriors’ who couldn’t survive but they never lost.

As a society we fear talking about cancer so much that that even if we do, we only tell the stories of cancer survivors. It is inspiring and definitely shines a ray of hope for others but the reality is that not everyone gets to be a survivor against cancer and in doing so, we end up ignoring the courage of patients and their families who couldn’t win against cancer while they too must have fought with their all the energy they had.

A diagnosis of cancer doesn’t just affect the patient, it shakes the core of the family members, friends and even neighbours. It requires tremendous amount of courage to accept the challenge and fight back. Every cancer patient and their caregivers are true warriors who inspire the world with their grit to fight and live against the biggest challenge to mankind.

This year, on the world cancer day, I want to share an inspiring story of Yasmine Gloria who was a cancer warrior and while she couldn’t win, she gave a tough fight to cancer. She was too young to get this disease, but as the destiny had it, she got diagnosed with Osteosarcoma at a tender age of 11 years. She endured multiple surgeries and numerous cycles of chemotherapy over next couple of years. Meanwhile she continued her studies and became a law graduate, unfortunately cancer had its own plans to come back and hit harder this time. The disease had spread to other organs and the battle began to defeat cancer this time. Instead of doing into depression, Yasmine got transformed in to a powerful princess who was ready to take on this challenge with her own swag. She continued her fight and while doing so she would proudly post beautiful pictures and videos flaunting her crutches, scalp without hairs and surgical scars on Instagram and she would express herself with captions that would be enough to belittle the best of influencers. One needs to be an evolved soul to be like her.

Some of her picture captions, Yasmine says “I am cute on the outside and cancerous on the inside” with a laughing emoji, “Cancer be like: you’re not taking me seriously” with a funny emoji.

Even though she had accepted her fate and never complained, but she wrote this in her last post dated October 15, 2024, before she left this world- “I might not be a survivor at the end but it’s okay, the word survivor irks me anyway. Because it takes away the credit or diminishes the bravery of those who didn’t make it. Not everyone is gonna be a survivor but everyone fought till the end with all their might. Not everyone gets to ring the bell but you best believe I will hold the bell for my fellow warrior to ring it if need be”.

While the disease may defeat the body, it cannot win over the ‘spirit to live’ and this is what we need to celebrate to ensure the mankind does get to completely defeat cancer one day. Life is unpredictable and destiny could be cruel but it’s the warriors’ grit that drives us to continue the fight and not surrender to our fears.

As we celebrate triumph against cancer, let’s not forget the warriors like Yasmine Gloria who fought with all their might till the end and showed us the path to continue this fight.

World Cancer Day 2025–2027 theme is “United by Unique”, highlighting the importance of personalised care and treatment to cater to each individual’s unique needs. As we see more and more people getting affected with cancer, it has become even more important to understand every individual’s clinical, nutritional, physiological, psychological and personal needs and work with them to mount a formidable battle against cancer as this fight is only going to get bigger.