No nipples please, we're Kiwis

New Zealand is making headlines overseas for refusing to allow naked breasts in a cancer campaign on television. A controversial advert - first aired in the UK - shows real pictures of women's breasts affected by cancer. The campaign resulted in a 50 percent rise in the number of women contacting their GP about breast cancer. But New Zealand's Commercial Approval Bureau, an industry body that classifies ads on behalf of broadcasters, has told health campaigners that nipples aren't permitted on TV adverts here. The newspaper Herald Scotland carried the story and quoted a breast cancer survivor who said it was "quite tragic" the ad wasn't being played in New Zealand. "That advert saved my life," Janet Brodie said, saying she went to the doctor only after seeing the advert and recognising she had some signs of breast cancer. "We're in the 21st century and if it helps one person to go to their doctor and do what they've got to do, if it saves one person's life, it should be shown," she said. The New Zealand Breast Cancer Foundation argues the importance of knowing all the signs and symptoms far outweighs the commercial watchdog's concerns. I agree with the foundation on that one. It's not like there's anyone jacking off in the background. But enough about that because in other cancer-related news, a commonly used blood pressure drug could help fight cancer by opening up blood vessels in solid tumours. Used beside conventional cancer-fighting drugs, it could improve life expectancy, experts believe. Following successful testing in mice, doctors plan to give losartan to patients with pancreatic cancer to see if it can tackle this hard-to-treat disease. Currently, only 5% of pancreatic cancer patients survive for at least 5 years. This is partly because only one in 10 people with the disease has a tumour that is operable.