In the United States, lung cancer is the second most common cancer in both men and women (not counting skin cancer).

 

 

 

 

 

Source:
American Cancer Society.
What are the key statistics for lung cancer?
October 2008. Available at http://www.cancer.org (accessed on 25 June 2009).

 

 

 

 

 

¹ The National Cancer Institute predicts that 1 in 12 men and 1 in 18 women will get the disease at some time in their lives. Lung cancer is also the leading cause of death from cancer in the United States .

About 215,020 new cases of lung cancer are diagnosed each year in the United States.

 

 

 

 

 

Source:
American Cancer Society.
What are the key statistics for lung cancer?
October 2008. Available at http://www.cancer.org (accessed on 25 June 2009).

 

 

 

 

 

¹ About 15 in 100 new cancer cases are lung cancer. More Americans die from lung cancer each year than from breast cancer, bowel cancer and prostate cancer combined.

The good news is that lung cancer is becoming less common in men, since a peak in the late 1980s. And figures have leveled off in women. This is probably because fewer people are smoking.

 

 

 

 

 

Source:
Williams MD, Sandler AB.
The epidemiology of lung cancer.
Cancer Treatment & Research. 2001; 105: 31-52.

 

 

 

 

 

²

However, a study of people born since 1950 shows just how quickly such trends may change.

 

 

 

 

 

Source:
Jemal A, Chu KC, Tarone RE.
Recent trends in lung cancer mortality in the United States.
Journal of the National Cancer Institute. 2001; 93: 277-283.

 

 

 

 

 

³ Researchers found that among people in their 20s and 30s, there were small increases in the number dying from lung cancer. They suggest this may be due to the rise in teenage smoking.

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