Cancer mortality rates continue to decline, with five-year survival rates reaching milestones, according to the American Cancer Society’s (ACS) annual cancer statistics report released on January 13.
The ACS reported that about seven in 10 people who were diagnosed with cancer are reaching the five-year survival milestone, up from less than half of people in the mid-’70s. Still, lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death in both men and women, while breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death in women.
“It’s tremendous progress. What’s really exciting about it is that it’s largely driven, especially in the last 30 years, by improvements in survival for more fatal and distant-stage cancers,” Rebecca Siegel, report author and ACS senior scientific director of surveillance research, told AuntMinnie. “Many of those cancers now are able to be treated like a chronic disease rather than a death sentence.”
The ACS each year estimates the numbers of new cancer cases and deaths in the U.S. It uses the most recent data collected by central cancer registries (incidence, through 2022) and the National Center for Health Statistics (mortality, through 2023). This is the 75th year of the ACS reporting on the national cancer burden.
Siegel and colleagues presented the following overall findings:
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About 2.1 million new cancer cases and more than 626,000 cancer deaths are projected to occur in the U.S. in 2026.
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The cancer mortality rate continues to decline, with about 4.8 million fewer deaths since 1991.
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The overall five-year relative survival rate reached 70% for diagnoses between 2015 and 2021 (up from 63%). This rate also reached 69% (up from 54%) for regional‐stage disease and 35% for distant‐stage disease (up from 17%) compared with results reported in the mid-‘90s.
The authors attributed these trends to smoking reductions, earlier detection, and improved treatment.
“It’s the culmination of decades of research,” Siegel said. “It takes so much time to understand cancer. Now, we’re able to treat people with more targeted therapies that are less toxic.”
Lung and breast cancers still lead in mortality
The ACS reported that lung cancer remains the leading cancer death, “killing more people than second‐ranking colorectal cancer and third‐ranking pancreatic cancer combined.”
However, there’s good news. In terms of five-year relative survival, the regional lung cancer survival rate jumped from 20% to 37%, while the metastatic lung cancer survival rate increased from 2% to 10%.
About 87% of lung cancers in men and 84% in women are tied to cigarette smoking, the report states. And while smoking prevalence dropped from 42% in 1964 to 11% in 2023, lung cancer will still account for nearly 183,000 cancer deaths in 2026, the ACS found.
The report also highlighted how the use of low-dose CT (LDCT) has reduced the odds of lung cancer mortality by 16% to 24% among high-risk individuals. However, the modality is underutilized, the authors wrote.
Rebecca Siegel talks about how mammography for breast cancer screening, low-dose CT for lung cancer screening, and advances in treatment contribute to cancer trends described in the ACS’ annual cancer statistics report.
In women, meanwhile, breast cancer, lung cancer, and colorectal cancer account for 50% of all new diagnoses in women, with breast cancer alone accounting for nearly one-third of cases.
Since its peak in 1989, breast cancer mortality in women has dropped by 44% through 2023. This translates to 546,000 deaths being avoided.
Siegel said that advances in imaging and treatment approaches have helped with these trends through earlier cancer detection and targeted therapies.
Proposed federal funding cuts loom
The report also highlighted how proposed federal cuts to cancer research and health insurance threaten the progress made toward lowering cancer mortality. The ACS said this funding provides access to life‐saving cancer treatment.
Proposed cuts include funding for programs within the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), research through the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and Medicaid.
Siegel discusses how proposed federal cuts to health research threatens progress made toward cancer survival and patient access to treatments.
This comes as incidence rates rise for some common cancers. These include prostate, breast, and thyroid cancers, and melanoma of the skin.
Siegel said that while improvements in cancer survival have been made, more work needs to be done, and research will be key in better understanding cancer. She added that while that fight continues, people can take steps toward mitigating cancer risk. These include maintaining a healthy body weight, avoiding smoking, staying physically active, having a healthy diet, and avoiding alcohol.
“People need to remember there are things we can do every single day to reduce our cancer risk,” she told AuntMinnie.