Thaindian News

Vancouver, May 10 (IANS) Canada’s cancer death rate declined over the past 19 years thanks to healthy lifestyles, improvements in screening and early detection, statistics released by the Canadian Cancer Society showed.

The overall death rates dropped by 21 percent in men and 9 percent in women between 1988 and 2007, saving nearly 100,000 lives, said the report Wednesday.

The decline in death rates were seen in all four major cancers: lung, colorectal, breast and prostate, which account for 53 percent of newly diagnosed cancers in both men and women, reported Xinhua.

The decline in smoking rates and improvements in screening and early detection are said to be the primary reasons behind the death rate drop.

“A large body of evidence accumulated over the last 30 years shows that about half of cancers can be prevented,” says Gillian Bromfield, director of Cancer Control Policy of the Canadian Cancer Society.

“Even greater gains can be made in reducing cancer rates if more is done to help Canadians embrace healthy lifestyles and if governments do more to create policies that encourage people to make these changes.”

The statistics also found the rise in the incidence of such cancers as liver, thyroid and kidney, which could be attributed to obesity and growing immigration from countries where hepatitis B and C virus infections and alcohol abuse are more common.

Smoking, unhealthy diet, physical inactivity, overweight, alcohol consumption, over-exposure to the sun and exposure to environmental and workplace carcinogens account for a substantial number of cancer diagnoses and deaths each year.