Cancer deaths -- even in the young -- drop dramatically

By Sheilah Downey (sheilahd@foodconsumer.org)

Improvements in detection, treatment and prevention are credited with the "major decline" in deaths from cancer in the United States since the early 1950s, states new research.

Younger adults aged 35 to 45 are seeing the steepest declines in cancer deaths, according to the report by Dr. Eric Kort, of Van Andel Research Institute in Grand Rapids, Mich., and colleagues, published in the journal Cancer Research today.

"A major decline in cancer mortality has been occurring in the United States for the past 50 years," wrote researchers, "affecting birth cohorts born as long as 80 years ago."

Scientists said earlier detection and treatment "have reduced the risks of cancer deaths across the life span for individuals born in the last three quarters of the 20th century."

Previous studies have averaged all age groups together rather than focusing on specific ages, which, said scientists, could possibly conceal the shifts in cancer experiences of the younger age groups.

This study focused on age-specific data recorded since 1955 to assess the effects of age, period and cohort in death trends due to cancer.

"During the second half of the 20th century," wrote researchers, "each successive decade of births from 1925 to 1995 experienced a lower risk of cancer death than its predecessor at virtually every age."

Much of the decline in cancer has occurred despite the relatively stable incidences of cancer cases, said researchers. The only exception to the decline in cancer rates, they said, was lung cancer.

The American Cancer Society has reported steady declines in the cancer rate since 1991. The first reported drop in actual numbers of death was a decline of 369 deaths from 2002 to 2003.

The number of cancer deaths took a dramatic downward swing in 2004 when the ACS reported 3,014 fewer deaths for that year than 2003.