Latest research reveals growing crisis of cancer-related deaths
Print Edition
Chronic infections, smoking and pollution have contributed to skyrocketing cases of cancer in China, with an estimated 4.3 million new diagnoses last year and 2.8 million deaths, according to the latest research.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in China, said the report published in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians and led by Chen Wanqing of the National Cancer Center in Beijing.
The report described cancer as a major public health problem in China.
The report said that the burden of cancer had been difficult to estimate in the past because research was based on small samples of the population — less than 2 percent — and used old data sets from the 1990s.
But higher quality data in recent years has come from a number of population-based registries via the National Central Cancer Registry of China. The latest report is based on data from 72 local cancer registries, dating from 2009 to 2011 and representing 6.5 percent of the population.
Using that information, researchers projected there would have been 4,292,000 newly diagnosed invasive cancer cases last year. That would equal almost 12,000 new cancer diagnoses a day, and 7,500 deaths.
The most common forms of cancer in men were lung, stomach, esophagus, liver, and colorectum.
In women, breast cancer was the most common, making up about 15 percent of all new cases of cancer. Following breast cancer, cancers of the lungs, stomach, colorectum and esophagus made up the bulk of women’s cases.
Cancer is more deadly for men than women in China, killing men at a rate of 166 per 100,000 cases, about twice the rate for women.
Mortality rates from cancer since 2006 are down significantly — about 21 percent per year. But due to the aging and expanding population, the overall number of cancer deaths has substantially increased — by 74 percent — during the same period, said the report.
Chronic infections of the stomach, liver and cervix led to nearly one third of all cancer deaths. Smoking accounted for about a quarter of all cancer deaths.
“Outdoor air pollution, considered to be among the worst in the world, indoor air pollution through heating and cooking using coal and other biomass fuels, and the contamination of soil and drinking water mean that the Chinese population is exposed to many environmental carcinogens,” said the report.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
