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Report: Cancer, mortality rates down in U.S.

Category: Cancer Detection and Tumor Markers

Across almost every gender and ethnic group in the U.S., both the pervasiveness of cancer diagnoses and mortality rates associated with the disease have dropped in recent years, researchers say.

A report by the National Cancer Institute, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Cancer Society and the American Association of Central Cancer Registries revealed that cancer diagnosis rates decreased by about 1 percent each year between 1999 and 2006, CNN reports.

Similarly, the report, which was published in the journal Cancer, said that mortality rates among American men declined by about 2 percent per year between 2001 and 2006 and by roughly 1.5 percent each year among U.S. women over the same time span.

"Death rates for all cancers combined from 2002 through 2006 were highest for black men and women and lowest for Asian/Pacific Islander men and women," the report said.

Despite drops among overall cancer cases, both genders experienced a rise in diagnosis rates of leukemia and melanoma, according to the news source.

According to the American Cancer Society, death rates from breast cancer in women have been declining since 1990, largely due to early detection mammography testing and improving treatments.