Study Finds: Breast Cancer Cases in US Rise Despite Declining Death Rates: ScienceAlert

Breast cancer rates are rising sharply in the United States, driven by increases among younger women and Asian Americans, according to a study Tuesday.

The American Cancer Society's biennial report found that the number of cases increased by one percent each year from 2012 to 2021, although overall mortality continued its historic downward trend, falling 44 percent from 1989 to 2022.

Breast cancer is the second most common cancer diagnosed in women in the United States and the second leading cause of cancer-related death after lung cancer.

Approximately one in eight women in the United States will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer in their lifetime and one in 43, or two percent, will die from the disease.

Over the past decade, breast cancer rates have risen faster among women under 50 than among older women – 1.4 percent per year versus 0.7 percent per year, the report said, for reasons that are not immediately clear.

By race, Asian American women experienced the fastest increase in incidence, followed by Hispanics, which the paper said “may be related in part to the influx of new immigrants who are at increased risk of breast cancer.”

Overall, the breast cancer mortality rate fell by 44 percent from 33 deaths per 100,000 women in 1989 to 19 deaths per 100,000 in 2022, resulting in approximately 517,900 deaths avoided.

But despite decades of medical advances in treatment and earlier detection, the benefits are felt unevenly.

Mortality rates have remained unchanged among Native Americans since 1990, while black women suffer 38 percent more deaths than white women, despite five percent fewer cases.

The paper says these findings “highlight disadvantages in social determinants of health” and “long-standing systemic racism and have resulted in poorer access to quality care across the cancer continuum.”

For example, although black women report having mammograms more often than white women, “they are more likely to undergo screening at facilities that have fewer resources and/or are not accredited by the American College of Radiology,” it says Study.

The authors recommended increasing racial diversity in clinical trials and community partnerships that increase access to high-quality screening for underserved women.

In April, an influential US medical body recommended that women should be screened for breast cancer every two years starting at age 40.

The US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) had previously said that women in their 40s should make an individual decision about when to start mammograms based on their health history and reserved its binding recommendation for those over 50 become years old.

© Agence France Press