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Cancer rates continue to drop
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Death rates from cancer are dropping more quickly across the US, offering what one expert calls a "glimmer of hope" against a leading killer. Cancer death rates fell by 2.1 percent each year from 2002 through 2004 - almost double the 1.1 percent annual decline recorded between 1993 and 2003.
"That's a very encouraging finding. It's the key indicator of progress in cancer," says Dr. David Espey, a cancer epidemiologist from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta. Dr. Espey is assigned to the Indian Health Service Division of Epidemiology and Disease Control, in Albuquerque, N.M.
Dr. Espey is lead author of the Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, 1975-2004, Featuring Cancer in American Indians and Alaska Natives. This report was published in the medical journal Cancer.
The report, which appears annually, is a joint effort from the American Cancer Society (ACS), the CDC, the US National Cancer Institute (NCI), and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries (NAACCR).
Most Cancer Types See Decline
Data on new cancer diagnoses came from state and regional population-based cancer registries, while data on cancer deaths came from the CDC's National Vital Statistics System.
Death rates declined for many of the top 15 cancers in both men and women. Most notably, men saw declines in death rates for lung, prostate, and colorectal cancers, while women saw declines in colorectal and breast cancer. The breast cancer declines could be due to declines in the use of hormone replacement therapy (HRT), experts say.
In addition, the increase in death rates from lung cancer among women slowed considerably. Lung cancer incidence in women stabilized from 1998 through 2004, after a long period of increases. In men, the lung cancer rate declined 1.8 percent annually from 1991 through 2004.
Rates of colorectal cancer fell by more than 2 percent per year for both men and women, probably because of better screening and removal of precancerous polyps.
Overall, incidence rates for all cancers decreased slightly from 1992 through 2004, after increasing between 1975 and 1992.
"This is the first time we have seen good news in lung cancer," says Dr. Corey J. Langer, director of thoracic and head and neck medical oncology at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. "It's probably mostly a reflection of the drop in smoking rates."
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