New atlases detail global cancer burden

Tobacco use now kills 5 million people a year and if people continue to smoke the way they do now, their habit will kill half a billion who are alive today, according to a new cancer atlas published on Monday.

The International Union Against Cancer, the World Health Organization and the American Cancer Society have published two new cancer atlases that provide snapshots of what cancer looks like now across the world, and how it will affect people in the future.

"In 2002 there were 10.9 million new cancer cases in the world, and 6.7 million deaths," one of the reports noted.

In 2002, there were 965,000 new lung cancer cases in men and 387,000 in women globally. There were 1.15 million new breast cancer cases, 930,000 cases of stomach cancer, 679,000 new cases of prostate cancer, and 1 million new colon cancer cases.

Infections cause 1.9 million cases of cancer, or nearly 18 percent of all cases globally, according to one of the atlases, published on the Internet at http://www.cancer.org/international.

"The most important agent is the bacterium Helicobacter pylori (the cause of 5.6 percent of all cancers), which increases the risk of stomach cancer between five- and sixfold," one of the reports noted.

All cervical cancers are caused by any one of 20 different strains of human wart virus, also called human papillomavirus, while hepatitis B and C can cause liver cancer.

A far bigger cause of cancer is poor diet. "Up to 30 percent of cancers are related to diet and nutrition," the atlas read - 20 percent in developing countries.

People should aim to eat at least 400 grams (14 ounces) a day of fruits and vegetables, avoid alcohol and foods preserved with salt, and avoid weight gain of more than 10 pounds (5 kg) during adulthood, the reports advised.

Yet red meat consumption has risen dramatically in the developed world. Several studies have linked red meat with cancer risk.

Intake of red meat in industrialized countries grew from 61 kg (135 pounds) per person a year in 1965 to 88.2 kilograms (194 pounds) per person per year in 1999.

In South Asia, people eat less red meat - 5.3 kg (12 pounds) per person per year, up from 3.9 kg (8.5 pounds) in 1965, while the average is 9.4 kg (20 pounds) per person in sub-Saharan Africa, barely changed from 40 years ago.

The atlas noted that many more girls and boys are overweight today than in the past, and may thus have a higher cancer risk.

For instance, the atlas showed 34 percent of 15-year-old boys in the United States are overweight, 25 percent in Canada, 21 percent in Spain, 20 percent in Italy, 12 percent in France and 7 percent in Russia.

The numbers are lower for 15-year-old girls, with 20 percent in the United States being overweight, 18 percent in Canada, 11 percent in Spain, 10 percent in France and Norway, and 3 percent in Russia.