Report offers insight into cancer prevalence

Details of cancer burden statistics will prove invaluable in public health efforts toward prevention and early detection.

By Stephanie Stapleton, AMNews staff. Dec. 23/30, 2002.

Washington -- A new collection of cancer incidence data promises to provide key information about specific cancer rates across state and geographic locations and among black and white adults. Ultimately, it could make a long-term difference in cancer prevention and treatment.

"U.S. Cancer Statistics: 1999 Incidence" is heralded as the most comprehensive federal data available to date on state-specific cancer incidence rates.

"With this new data, we can better identify, understand and address differences in cancer rates across the country," said Dept. of Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson. "The state and regional data will prove invaluable to public health officials as they plan and evaluate cancer control programs and conduct research."

In the past, national estimates of the cancer burden have been based on data reports covering about 14% of Americans, explained Hannah Weir, PhD, an author of the report and a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention epidemiologist in the division of cancer prevention and control. These data represent about 78% of the U.S. population -- a huge difference, she added.

Among the report's findings: Prostate cancer is the leading cancer in men, regardless of race, followed by lung cancer and colon or rectal cancer. However, prostate cancer rates are 1.5 times higher in black men than in white men. [...]