Study tracks global patterns and socioeconomic inequalities in the burden of breast cancer

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer death among women globally, accounting for nearly 2.3 million new cases and 670,000 deaths in 2022 alone. While traditional metrics like annual incidence rates provide a snapshot of disease burden, they do not capture the cumulative probability that an individual will face breast cancer over their entire lifetime. Moreover, the interplay of reproductive patterns, lifestyle factors, screening access, and treatment quality varies enormously across regions with different levels of economic development. Based on these challenges, there is a clear need for a more intuitive, comparable indicator that accounts for life expectancy and competing mortality risks to guide global cancer control strategies.

Now, researchers from institutions including the National Cancer Center of China, the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, the Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University, and Beijing University of Chinese Medicine have published (DOI: 10.20892/j.issn.2095-3941.2026.0059) the most comprehensive assessment of breast cancer lifetime risk to date. The study, appearing in Cancer Biology & Medicine, analyzed data from GLOBOCAN 2022, United Nations population statistics, and global health expenditure databases. The team used the adjusted for multiple primaries (AMP) method to calculate lifetime risks across 20 geographic regions, 185 countries, and different age and menopausal status groups.

The global lifetime risk of developing breast cancer from birth to death was 5.51% (95% CI: 5.50%-5.52%), meaning approximately 1 in 18 individuals will receive a diagnosis. The risk of dying from the disease was 1.82% (95% CI: 1.82%-1.83%), or about 1 in 55 individuals. However, these averages mask dramatic variation: in very high Human Development Index (HDI) regions, the lifetime risk of developing breast cancer reached 10.37% — more than 3.5 times the 2.91% risk observed in low HDI regions. Australia and New Zealand had the highest regional risk at 14.98%, while Middle Africa had the lowest at 2.16%. At the country level, Luxembourg topped the list at 16.62%, while Bhutan, Sierra Leone, and Angola had lifetime risks below 1%.

The study also found that the lifetime risk of dying from breast cancer was highest in very high HDI regions (2.70%), followed by low HDI regions (1.70%) — a pattern reflecting both higher incidence in wealthy countries and poorer survival outcomes in resource-limited settings. Temporal trend analysis across 36 countries with long-term surveillance data showed significant increases in lifetime risk in 32 countries between 2003 and 2017, with the steepest rises in the Republic of Korea [average annual percentage change (AAPC) of 5.84%] and Japan (5.21%).

"These findings show that breast cancer is not a single global disease but a collection of different epidemics shaped by economic development, health system capacity, and demographic structure," the authors said. "In high-income countries, the challenge is managing a high lifetime risk driven by lifestyle and reproductive factors, while in low-income regions, the priority must be improving early detection and treatment access to reduce the unacceptably high proportion of deaths among younger women. The 3.5-fold gap in diagnosis risk and the reversal of mortality patterns across HDI levels tell us that one-size-fits-all approaches will fail — each country needs a strategy tailored to its own risk profile and resources."

The lifetime risk estimates provide an intuitive tool for health communication and policy planning. For very high HDI countries, the findings support refining screening strategies for postmenopausal women, who account for nearly 72% of the lifetime risk in these regions. For low and middle HDI countries, where premenopausal and perimenopausal women contribute disproportionately to the breast cancer burden, the study suggests initiating screening at younger ages — around 40 or 45 — and strengthening diagnostic and treatment capacity. With breast cancer incidence rising in most countries, these data offer an evidence-based foundation for allocating limited health resources to where they can have the greatest impact on reducing global breast cancer inequities.