New research released this Wednesday shows that almost 1.3 million people will die of cancer in the European Union this year, but death rates from the disease are on a steady decline.
The study included all types of cancer across the 27-country EU block found that more men than women are likely to die from the disease, and that “substantial reductions” in the number of deaths from breast cancer would lower death rates for women.
However breast cancer remains the leading cause of female cancer deaths in the block. Lung cancer, caused mainly by smoking or inhaling second-hand smoke, kills more men in the European Union than any other type of cancer. Researchers from Italy and Switzerland, writing in the Annals of Oncology journal, predicted EU cancer death rates of 139 per 100,000 men and 85 per 100,000 women in 2012.
In 2003, the European Code Against Cancer set a goal to reduce cancer mortality by 15% by the year 2012. According to the team this target may already be achieved in 2012. The researchers explain, “The percent decline estimated by 2012 is 18% in men and 13% in women. Thus the 15% decline in cancer mortality rates may have already been achieved after 12 years in men, and appears close for women, in spite of the unfavorable trends in female lung cancer rates.” In order to calculate rates of cancer deaths each year and to identify trends, the team used data on cancer deaths in the EU from 1970 to 2007. These calculations and trends were then used to predict cancer mortality rates for 2012. The team also predicted EU cancer deaths in 2011. The researchers said, “Estimating current cancer mortality figures is important for defining priorities for prevention and treatment.”
Compared with confirmed deaths in 2007 - the latest year for which there are World Health Organization death rate data for most EU countries - this would represent a fall of 10 percent in men and 7 percent in women, they write. “Although actual numbers of deaths are slightly higher than those recorded for 2007, this is because a greater number of people are living into old age in the EU,” said Fabio Levi of the Cancer Epidemiology Unit at the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine and Lausanne University in Switzerland. “The age-adjusted cancer mortality rates show a clear decrease in rates for both men and women over the past five years.”
Levi explained that the decline is due partly to falling smoking rates among men, and partly to advances in the prevention, detection and treatment of breast cancer in women.
Details of the analysis, which used EU data from 1970 to 2007 to calculate rates of death each year and identify trends, showed that breast cancer remains the leading cause of female cancer deaths in the EU as a whole, and in particular in France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Some 88,000 women will die from it in 2012, around 16 percent of all cancer deaths in EU women.
Carlo La Vecchia, a professor at Italy's Milan University, who worked with Levi on the stud, said, “The fact that there will be substantial falls in deaths from breast cancer, not only in middle age, but also in the young, indicates that important advancements in treatment and management are playing a major role in the decline in death rates, rather than mammographic screening, which is usually restricted to women aged 50-70 in most European countries. In general, many important risk factors for breast cancer, including menstrual and reproductive factors, physical activity and obesity, have not changed favorably, and breast cancer incidence has probably not gone down, yet deaths from the disease are declining.”
But in Britain and Poland, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths among women, with rates of 21.4 and 16.9 per 100,000 women respectively. Lung cancer is expected to kill more than 183,000 men and more than 78,000 women in the EU in 2012. Rates of pancreatic cancer are rising among both men and women in the EU: the study predicted a rise from 7.86 cases per 100,000 men in 2007 to 8.01 in 2012, and from 5.24 to 5.38 per 100,000 women.
La Vecchia said this was “somewhat surprising” for men, given the decline in smoking, since smoking and being overweight or obese are known to be risk factors for pancreatic cancer. He added, however, that increasing rates of obesity may be one reason for the rise in the rate of pancreatic cancer, as well as better diagnosis and certification. “We do not know the causes of 70 percent of pancreatic cancers, but this rise is certainly not reassuring,” he said.
Dr Rachel Greig, of the charity Breakthrough Breast Cancer, said, “Whilst we know breast cancer incidence is on the increase, it's reassuring to see positive indications that the rate of breast cancer deaths could decrease in 2012. At Breakthrough we know better awareness and treatment are leading to more people than ever surviving the disease. However, 12,000 women are still dying every year in the UK so we must continue to invest in research and education and women must continue to be breast aware.”
Catherine Thomson, head of statistical information at Cancer Research UK, said the study, like others, “shows that generally death rates from cancer in the UK are predicted to fall”.
Diane Abbott, the Shadow Health Minister, said of the reduction in British deaths, “I obviously welcome this decline, which happened under Labour. It is also a tribute to the campaigners who raised awareness of breast cancer…It's one of the many aspects of health that improved under Labour.”
A Department of Health spokesman said, “This study reflects advancements in cancer services, but our survival rates still lag behind comparable countries…That's why we are investing more than £750 million to make sure people are diagnosed with cancer earlier and have better access to the latest treatments. Through our investment and modernization of the NHS, our aim is to save 5,000 more lives every year by 2015 - closing the gap in cancer survival between us and the best-performing countries in the world.”
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