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Cancer trends are shifting according to a new study released this month. While the American Cancer Society’s annual survey found deaths from the disease declined by 34% between 1991 and 2022, more young and middle aged women are getting cancer.
According to The American Cancer Society, more than 2 million new cases of cancer will be diagnosed in 2025 and more than 600,000 people will die. This is despite new techniques coming out for detecting and treating many cancers. Those gains are threatened by the increase in early onset cancers affecting people under the age of 65.
“Continued reductions in cancer mortality because of drops in smoking, better treatment and earlier detection is certainly great news,” said Rebecca Siegel, senior scientific director of surveillance research at the American Cancer Society, in a statement. “However, this progress is tempered by rising incidence in young and middle-aged women, who are often the family caregivers, and a shifting cancer burden from men to women.”
SEE ALSO: Heightened Cancer Risks For Black Women Under 50: Here Is What To Know And Do About It
The report shows women are seeing spikes in cancer diagnoses. Cancer incidence rates among women under age 50 were 82% higher than their male counterparts in 2021, that’s up from 51% in 2002. The study also found women between 50-64 are getting cancer at higher rates than men.
In particular, breast cancer has been rising faster among women under 50 years old. It’s gone up by 1.4% a year since the mid 2000s, compared to an 0.7% annual rise among older women.
The American Cancer Society’s report also highlights racial inequities in cancer treatment. Researchers found Black and Native American people are 2 to 3 times more likely to die from certain cancers than their white counterparts. Cervical cancer is responsible for a majority of those deaths.
However, across the board, mortality rates are increasing among cancers of the oral cavity, pancreas, uterine corpus and liver.
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