U.S. lung cancer rates cut

Press, 19 February 1986, Page 21

U.S. lung cancer rates cut

NZPA staff correspondent Washington Lung cancer rates have dropped significantly among white men in the United States for the first time in half a century, the decline being attributed to reduction in smoking. The National Cancer Institute has reported a drop of 4 per cent in lung cancer rates among white males between 1982 and 1983, the latest data available. “It is believed that this decrease is related to the decreasing prevalence of cigarette smoking by males which began in 1964,” said the report by the cancer institute.

That was the year the surgeon-general in the United States issued the Government’s first major report warning that cigarettes could cause cancer and other diseases.

The N.C.l.’s director, Dr Vincent Devita, was reported as saying the survey result “proves that people can successfully reduce their cancer risk by quitting smoking or not taking up smoking.” The researchers called the findings “the first time that a significant decrease in lung cancer has been observed among any racesex group in the United States.” The decline in incidence has not yet affected the death rate from lung cancer

among white males, but if the trend continues that is expected to be lowered as

However, the decline in lung cancer among white males was not matched in black men and women of all races.

Officials at the institute have said smoking among women is decreasing, but at a much slower rate than among white men. Lung cancer is expected to surpass breast cancer as the leading cause of cancer deaths among American women this year. Dr Devita said it was a “tragedy” that “lung cancer continues to increase among women.”

Based on current smoking

patterns among women, the N.C.I. did not expect to see any significant decrease in lung cancer among women for another 15 to 20 years.

Dr Devita said that for black men the annual rate of occurrence for new cases of lung cancer was almost 60 per cent higher than for white men, “although it appears to be levelling off.” Lung cancer is now the major cause of cancer deaths all told. This year, according to the report, it will claim the lives of an estimated 125,600 Americans, 87,000 men and 38,600 women.

The report said that in 1965, 52 per cent of adult men over the age of 20 in the United States smoked

cigarettes, whereas early this year only about 30 per cent of men over 18 were cigarette smokers. It said smokers were four to 25 times more likely to develop lung cancer than non-smokers, depending on the amount they smoked, the age at which they began smoking and the amount they inhaled A report in the New England journal of medicine said that since 1973 there had been a steady downward trend in the over-all cigarette consumption in the United States, the 1983 figure of 3494 per head of population being the lowest in 35 years. Recent data had shown that the percentage of all

American men over the age of 20 who smoked had dropped from 38 per cent in 1980 to 35 per cent in 1983. For women of the same age, the drop was slight, from 29.4 per cent in 1980 to 29.1 per cent in 1983. r “A comparison with the 1965 prevalences of 52.4 per cent for men and 34.1 per ' r cent for women underscores J ’- : ' the fact that over a period - of almost two decades the 4 decline has been most pro- -* nounced among men.” However the journal also reported that the percent- ' 1 age classified as heavy.'---smokers (25 or more cigar- •“ ettes a day) had increased to 35 per cent of male smokers and 24 per cent of T the female smokers in 1980.