BMJ  2004;328:303 (7 February), doi:10.1136/bmj.328.7435.303

News

British cancer death rates fell by 12% between 1972 and 2002

Zosia Kmietowicz

London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

More people than ever in Britain are surviving cancer thanks largely to changes in lifestyle, screening services, earlier diagnoses, and prompt treatments, the latest figures have shown. Death rates have been falling while the incidence has been increasing.

Figures from Cancer Research UK show that the death rate for people dying from cancer in the United Kingdom fell by 12% between 1972 and 2002, although the rate of decrease in men is three times the rate in women (18% v 6%).

Improvements in mortality have been seen in the common cancers, such as breast, lung, and bowel cancer, as well as in the less common cancers, such as cancer of the stomach, bladder, and testis and in lymphomas and leukaemia.

The biggest fall in deaths was for stomach cancer. Since 1972 there has been a fall of 65% in the death rate both in men and in women from this . . . [Full text of this article]


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