Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2019 Dec;9(4):217-222.
doi: 10.2991/jegh.k.191008.001.

Current Cancer Epidemiology

Camilla Mattiuzzi  1 , Giuseppe Lippi  2
Affiliations
Review

Current Cancer Epidemiology

Camilla Mattiuzzi et al. J Epidemiol Glob Health. 2019 Dec.

Abstract

In this brief report, we offer a concise overview on current cancer epidemiology garnered from the official databases of World Health Organization and American Cancer Society and provide recent information on frequency, mortality, and survival expectancy of the 15 leading types of cancers worldwide. Overall, cancer poses the highest clinical, social, and economic burden in terms of cause-specific Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) among all human diseases. The overall 0-74 years risk of developing cancer is 20.2% (22.4% in men and 18.2% in women, respectively). A total number of 18 million new cases have been diagnosed in 2018, the most frequent of which are lung (2.09 million cases), breast (2.09 million cases), and prostate (1.28 million cases) cancers. Beside sex-specific malignancies, the ratio of frequency between men and women is >1 for all cancers, except thyroid (i.e., 0.30). As concerns mortality, cancer is the second worldwide cause of death (8.97 million deaths) after ischemic heart disease, but will likely become the first in 2060 (~18.63 million deaths). Lung, liver, and stomach are the three most deadly cancers in the general population, while lung and breast cancers are the leading causes of cancer related-mortality in men and women, respectively. Prostate and thyroid cancers have the best prognosis, with 5-year survival ~100%, while esophagus, liver, and especially pancreas cancers have the worst prognosis, typically <20% at 5 years. We hope that this report will provide fertile ground for addressing health-care interventions aimed at preventing, diagnosing, and managing cancer around the world.

Keywords: Cancer; epidemiology; frequency; mortality; statistics.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare they have no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Estimated epidemiologic trend of the fifth leading cause of death from years 2016 to 2060. COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Estimated epidemiologic trend of the five leading causes of cancer death from years 2016 to 2060.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Prognosis of the 15 most frequent types of cancer, inclusive of 5-year relative survival rate at different stages, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS). †Trachea, bronchus, and lung, ‡Liver and intrahepatic bile ducts.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Montagnana M, Lippi G. Cancer diagnostics: current concepts and future perspectives. Ann Transl Med. 2017;5:268. doi: 10.21037/atm.2017.06.20. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization . Global Health Estimates 2016: disease burden by cause, age, sex, by country and by region, 2000–2016. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2018. Available from: https://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/estimates/en/index1... (accessed July 9, 2019).
    1. International Agency for Research on Cancer Global cancer observatory - cancer fact sheets. Available from: http://gco.iarc.fr/today/fact-sheets-cancers (accessed July 9, 2019).
    1. GBD 2017 Disease and Injury Incidence and Prevalence Collaborators Global, regional, and national incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for 354 diseases and injuries for 195 countries and territories, 1990–2017: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017. Lancet. 2018;392:1789–858. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(18)32279-7. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization Projections of mortality and causes of death, 2016 to 2060. Available from: https://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/projections/en/ (accessed July 9, 2019).