UK cancer death rates to fall by 15% by 2035 due to advances in research

Death rates from cancer in the UK will fall by 15% by 2035 thanks to advances in research, diagnosis and treatment, with more Britons living longer after their diagnosis, the charity Cancer Research UK predicts.

Breakthroughs will prevent more than 403,000 deaths from the disease by 2035 that would have happened otherwise, according to an analysis from the charity.

However, although the risk of death from cancer is likely to fall, the number of people dying from it will continue to rise, because the ageing and growing population will result in more people being diagnosed, the charity said. Those factors, and the rise in cancers linked to bad diet and alcohol, mean that a typical Briton’s chances of getting cancer have recently risen from one in three to one in two.

Overall 331 people per 100,000 of population died from any form of cancer in July 2014. But improvements in doctors’ ability to detect, diagnose and treat cancer will see that fall to 280 people per 100,000 of population by 2035, CRUK estimates.

“Thanks to research fewer people will die from cancer in the future. We’re resolute that, by 2035, three in four people will survive their cancer for at least 10 years”, said Sir Harpal Kumar, CRUK’s chief executive. “This will mean making more progress in breast, bowel and blood cancers, but also accelerating our effort in those cancers which are currently hard to treat.”

Even though more people will die from cancer, the diminishing risk of death shows that cancer research and treatment are still yielding benefits and heading in the right direction, the charity said. For example, CRUK believes mortality rates from bowel cancer will fall by 23% over the next 20 years – from 32 to 25 deaths per 100,000 population – thanks to advances in surgery and chemotherapy and also better screening for the disease.

Death rates from breast cancer, the most common form of the disease among women, are projected to drop by 26% to 31 per 100,000 women by 2035. Likewise, mortality rates from lung cancer will be 21% lower by then – at 58 deaths per 100,000 people – according to CRUK’s analysis.

But deaths from pancreatic cancer are estimated to fall by only 3%, to 17 deaths per 100,000; and from brain and related tumours by just 2%, to ten deaths per 100,000 people, CRUK said.

However, the risk of death will increase for some cancers. For example, the mortality rate for liver cancer is expected to rise by 58% by 2035.

Simon Stevens, the chief executive of NHS England, which has made improving cancer outcomes one of its key priorities, said: “These figures underline how the NHS is successfully translating new research and targeted investment into dramatic gains in cancer care. Thanks to improvements over just the past year, an extra 2,400 families will be able to share this Christmas with a loved one who would not have survived cancer a year ago.”

CRUK’s statistical information team arrived at their conclusions by applying the difference in the actual cancer mortality rates in 2014 and the projected age-standardised death rates for all cancers combined in the UK between 2015 and 2035 to the Office for National Statistics’ projections for the UK population over the study period.

Kumar said that while survival rates for some forms of cancer had improved in recent decades, thanks to the development of new drugs and surgical techniques, the variation in death rates for different forms of cancer was still too wide. For example, mortality rates for brain cancer are likely to remain unchanged over the next 20 years, with just one in five patients surviving for five years. Similarly, just three in 100 people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer live for five years or more after diagnosis.

UK cancer death rates to fall by 15% by 2035 due to advances in research

Alcohol-related cancer to kill 135,000 in England by 2035 – study

Alcohol-related cancers will cause about 135,000 deaths and cost the NHS £2bn over the next 20 years in England, unless concerted action is taken to highlight the dangers of drinking, health campaigners have warned.

Cancer Research UK, which commissioned Sheffield University to come up with the figures, said the government urgently needed to counter public ignorance about the link between drinking and cancer and introduce minimum unit pricing (MUP) to prevent the number of deaths reaching 7,100 a year by 2035.

The analysis also forecasts more than 1.2m hospital admissions for alcohol-related cancer over the next two decades.

Alison Cox, the director of prevention at Cancer Research UK, said: “These new figures reveal the devastating impact alcohol will have over the coming years. That’s why it’s hugely important the public are aware of the link between alcohol and cancer, and what they can do to improve their risk.

“If we are to change the nation’s drinking habits and try to mitigate the impact alcohol will have, then national health campaigns are needed to provide clear information about the health risks of drinking alcohol.”

The majority of alcohol-related cancer deaths in 2035 are expected to come from oesophageal cancer (3,697), followed by bowel (1,369), other mouth and throat cancers (887), breast (835) and liver cancer (333).

Alcohol-related cancer deaths

Earlier this year, the government lowered the officially advised maximum weekly alcohol consumption by men to 14 units, bringing it in line with the existing limit for women.

But it said that there was no safe level of drinking for either sex, warning that any amount of alcohol consumption increased the risk of developing a range of cancers.

England’s chief medical officer, Dame Sally Davies, has said she would like people to think about their increased risk of cancer each time they reach for a glass of wine.

However, Cancer Research UK and its partners in the Alcohol Health Alliance believe there is still more the government can do, including introducing a 50p minimum unit price for alcohol in England.

The analysis, published on Friday, found that a 50p minimum price per unit of alcohol could, over 20 years, reduce alcohol-related deaths in England by about 7,200, including about 670 cancer deaths. It would also reduce healthcare costs by £1.3bn, the research suggests.

Prof Sir Ian Gilmore, chair of the Alcohol Health Alliance, said: “It is clear from the report that MUP will save lives, including those lost to cancer, and ease the burden on our health service. Importantly, MUP will do this while leaving moderate drinkers and prices in pubs and bars unaffected.

“In addition, we need mandatory health information on the labels of all alcoholic products, informing the public of the link between alcohol and cancer, and the new low-risk drinking guidelines.

“The public have the right to know about how their drinking impacts their health, so that they are empowered to make informed choices.”

The research assumes drinking trends will follow those seen over the last 40 years and takes into account recent falls in alcohol consumption.

Caroline Moye, head of the World Cancer Research Fund, said 21,000 cancer cases a year could be avoided in the UK if no one drank.

“After not smoking and being a healthy weight, not drinking alcohol is the best thing people can do to help reduce their cancer risk,” she said.

Responding to the study, the Department of Health highlighted the guidelines on alcohol consumption.

Rosanna O’Connor, director of drugs, alcohol and tobacco at Public Health England, said: “Anyone can reduce their risk of cancer by making changes to their lifestyle: drinking less alcohol, eating a balanced diet, staying physically active and not smoking.

“The One You campaign run by Public Health England will help achieve these aims and lower the risk of cancer by enabling everyone to live a healthier life.”

The Home Office said it was reviewing minimum pricing and would be watching implementation in Scotland.

Alcohol-related cancer to kill 135,000 in England by 2035 – study

500,000 Britons a year will be diagnosed with cancer by 2035, study shows

More than half a million Britons a year will be diagnosed with cancer by 2035, making it hard for NHS services to cope with the extra demand for testing and treatment, Cancer Research UK (CRUK) has warned.

The number of people across the UK found to have cancer every year is expected to rise from 352,000 to an estimated 514,000 in less than 20 years – more than 160,000 extra cases annually – according to research in the British Journal of Cancer.

The vast majority of the expected 162,000 additional cases – 141,000 – will be caused by the ageing and growing population. However, another 12,600 will be the result of a combination of lifestyle factors, such as smoking, alcohol or poor diet, and also improved screening for the disease.

In 1993, 127,000 men and 128,000 women were diagnosed with the disease. By 2014, the numbers had risen to 173,000 and 179,000 respectively. This future trends analysis, based on examining cancer data going back to 1979, predicts that 244,000 women and more than 270,000 men will be diagnosed in 2035.

Those big rises mean there is an “urgent need to plan for the future of NHS cancer services, which are already stretched to the limit as they struggle to cope with a growing and ageing population”, CRUK said.

“The number of people getting cancer in the UK will incerease sharply in the next two decades. This is mostly the result of an ageing and growing population but, for women, lifestyle factors are playing an increasingly important role”, said Dr Rebecca Smittenaar, the study’s lead author and CRUK’s statistics manager.

Part of the predicted increase in cancer rates has been attributed to improved screening for the disease. Photograph: Getty/Caiaimage

People’s risk of developing cancer will also rise in actual terms, separate to the growing numbers diagnosed, due to increased life expectancy and population expansion.

Cancer incidence rates have risen for both sexes in an almost unbroken way since records began in 1979, though they have recently begun edging downwards for men. Men have always been more likely than women to be diagnosed.

In 1993, 783 f every 100,000 men aged 15 or over were diagnosed with cancer. That rose to 808 per 100,000 in 2014 and is predicted to increase again, albeit slightly, to 812 per 100,000 in 2035.

The number of women in that age group who developed cancer rose from 564 per 100,000 people in 1993 to 664 per 100,000 in 2014. It is due to hit 685 by 2035, according to the study.

CRUK last year revised its prediction for the number of people who would develop cancer at some point in their lives from one in three to one in two.

Sir Harpal Kumar, the charity’s chief executive, said the expected increases in cancer cases were “shocking”. However, four in 10 cancers could be prevented if people drank less, did not smoke, ate a healthy diet and took more exercise, he said.

500,000 Britons a year will be diagnosed with cancer by 2035, study shows