Why cancer appears to be getting more common over time (but isn't)

I started looking into this in response to a post in the thread on JesseWolfe's wife but it's better suited to a new thread:

spitfirebill said:

We have lost so many people at my church the past several months to cancer.   Something seems out of kilter.    

I think cancer just appears to be a more prevalent cause of death due to better progress against health issues that can kill you but aren't cancer. Somewhat surprisingly, both cancer incidence and mortality have been decreasing in recent decades. I would've expected worse in a world that's had a few centuries to accumulate a range of manmade pollutants:

US data:

Long-term data on percentage of deaths by cause is hard to find, this is the best I found and it shows cancer deaths growing steadily until the '90s and just slightly decreasing in the '00s which is the latest data in the graph. Remember that reducing the causes in the purple/green/red bars will make the blue bar taller (meaning cancer becomes more common as a cause of death), and reducing cancer mortality is particularly difficult:

When I was dealing with leukemia two years ago, I saw an ad on TV that stated "Half of us will get cancer". I thought that couldn't possibly be right, but subsequent searching showed it is true. In my family my father, brother, sister and I have all had cancer, but all different types. We all are survivors, too.  I have to wonder why the incidence rate is up, but the mortality rate is going down with medical advances. The graphs clearly show improvement over the last 35 years.

Is it less common? Or just less *fatal*?

GameboyRMH said:

...Somewhat surprisingly, both cancer incidence and mortality have been decreasing in recent decades. I would've expected worse in a world that's had a few centuries to accumulate a range of manmade pollutants...

I think you may be missing how horrific the amount of direct exposure to pollutants (and other dangers such as pointed out above) use to be.  

I used to breath lead filled car exhaust, but my brain be fine good now... so not problem...

Makes sense but it still sucks. 

Beer Baron 🍺 said:

Is it less common? Or just less *fatal*?

Incidence covers that, so it looks like it's been getting less common since the '90s.

Beer Baron 🍺 said:

Is it less common? Or just less *fatal*?

Curing a disease is less profitable than treating it.

Before you think I'm a jerk, I've lost several family members to cancer and watched my mom fight it for almost 20 years. What she dealt with in the last year of it makes me question the sanity of our medical system.

In reply to aircooled :

Glyphosate has been in use for roughly 40 years.

Gluten allergies have only started being diagnosed in the last 20 years.

Humans have been eating gluten for thousands of years.

I'm not a doctor but maybe the problem is all the garbage we spray on the wheat.

We smoke fewer cigarettes.  That's a big contributor, possibly the biggest one.

Streetwiseguy said:

We smoke fewer cigarettes.  That's a big contributor, possibly the biggest one.

We are also 50 years in the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts. 

alfadriver said:

Streetwiseguy said:

We smoke fewer cigarettes.  That's a big contributor, possibly the biggest one.

We are also 50 years in the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts. 

And also 50 years into an astounding growth of processed "foods".  While we are better at treating cancer, diabetes and heart disease the incidence of the diseases has grown.

Cancer is a category of disease. We often name them for the location where they originate, but that is not always specific. 
 

I've had skin cancer, but the basal cell tumors were cured by removal, a far better prognosis than melanoma. 

ShawnG said:

Beer Baron 🍺 said:

Is it less common? Or just less *fatal*?

Curing a disease is less profitable than treating it.

Before you think I'm a jerk, I've lost several family members to cancer and watched my mom fight it for almost 20 years. What she dealt with in the last year of it makes me question the sanity of our medical system.

I've read many news articles where doctors say if they were diagnosed with cancer, they would skip chemo/radiation (in severe) cases and live there last weeks/months/years not being in and out of the hospital, sick, losing hair, etc.

Spent 30 years of my life in a lab trying to kill cancer in new and exciting ways. Same with HIV and now neurodegenerative disorders.  

Couple things, more people are living longer due to statins, worked on those as well for a bit, like seriously people used to drop dead of heart attacks in the 70's-80's all the time. Not anymore. People used to die of all sorts of things you don't think about. I have the photo below blown up in my office so I look at it every day and think about just how different it is now. 

Also detection is at a all time high, we are SO MUCH BETTER at finding cancer early in almost every single patient population its almost magic. Once we get the testing in place for identification of what drug has the highest chance of success for a few more of the major cancers the survivor rates will increase dramatically again. 

In reply to wearymicrobe :

You captured it well but was going to  add this.  Things that used to kill us don't anymore and we're living longer which just gives more spotlight to those things we can't cure. 
 

Overall cancer is going done and cancer isn't a new invention.  Lots of old bones out there prove that.  

Fueled by Caffeine said:

In reply to wearymicrobe :

You captured it well but was going to  add this.  Things that used to kill us don't anymore and we're living longer which just gives more spotlight to those things we can't cure. 
 

Overall cancer is going done and cancer isn't a new invention.  Lots of old bones out there prove that.  

So I want to add some context here because what I post is kind of partially true. IMO everybody makes it to about 70-75 now with modern medication, after that it's genetics. You can smoke, you can drink you can be vastly over weight your going to make it to 75 unless you roll some bad dice. Past that it's genetics and how well you kept yourself together to 70ish. 

If you are a good weight, keep an eye on your cholesterol and do everything right you will live past that number and be a decent health until statistics gets you. Cancer and cardiovascular being the big ones. 

In reply to wearymicrobe :

Even superficially, that seems pretty apparent.   Poster boy (died at 100, reportedly smoked 10-15 cigars a day):

aircooled said:

In reply to wearymicrobe :

Even superficially, that seems pretty apparent.   Poster boy (died at 100, reportedly smoked 10-15 cigars a day):

Yeah he is a outlier that is for sure. 

I have more then a dozen members of my family that passed between 99-104 years old. Al of them smoked for 60+ years, were over weight, ate greasy foods and generally lived a hard life. But the others died as early as 55 from hearth issues or WWI WWII. No idea where I am going to end up but my grandmother stopped working around 40ish and lived to 99 and her brother lived to 102 (plus two flying fortress crashes) so I am hoping I am on their side. Lots of cool stuff coming up and I want to see it. 

Grandmother went from being born in a house with dirt floors and no electricity to seeing moon landings and then the internet. Sharp as a tack the whole way as well. Crazy to think about it. 

Actuarial Table

Edit...

Here's a calculator for considering the longevity of two people (person "A", person "B", either, & both).

ShawnG said:

Gluten allergies have only started being diagnosed in the last 20 years.

Humans have been eating gluten for thousands of years.

I'm not a doctor but maybe the problem is all the garbage we spray on the wheat.

IMHO, most "gluten sensitivity" is BS.  Properly tracking dietary reactions is HARD, most people aren't willing to do it properly, and interpret the vague results as confirming whatever they were thinking at the beginning.

What IS real is Celiac disease, but it has a much lower incidence rate than people who claim "gluten sensitivity", as well as much more significant symptoms.  It's also been described as far back as the 2nd century AD and likely goes much further.

In reply to codrus (Forum Supporter) :

Sideline but my daughter just tested positive for celiac on the iga response blood test no real symptoms other than some unexplained weight loss.  So biopsy time it is. Apparently it's possible to have celiacs with no real intestinal symptoms. 

In reply to Fueled by Caffeine :

Interesting, my wife has not been diagnosed as Celiac.  Went on an elimination diet, ate a piece of toast then was confined to the bathroom for 24 hours.  Gluten sensitivity or Celiac?   First it was beer that bothered her then tortillas, pasta, kept blaming it on the other ingredients.

Looks like up to 6% of a given population is Gluten intolerant and 1% Celiac, some show up as IBS some do not.  Similar to % of people allergic to peanuts.

Wow!  lookup rates of Lactose intolerance strangely less common for northern Europeans.

Back to Cancer, Lost my father to the kind of leukemia you don't want as an adult.  Had a perfect bone marrow match with his brother, went to U of M for treatments all the best care.  In the end we declined further care and decided to not treat to death but live to death instead and threw a giant going away party.

Of all the old guys that have passed in my life, most were from disease related to job related environmental toxins or lifestyle related toxins.  The women, cancer or heart disease.   

In reply to Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) :

I've had the same. 2 Basal cells tumors removed. Really not a huge deal but technically I've had cancer. 

It for sure wasn't anything like what my mom had and eventually died of. 

Update: Ran across an interesting caveat that could help further explain why cancer appears to be getting more common and could sadly even reverse the trend in the future - it actually is getting more common with younger people specifically:

https://www.axios.com/2024/07/31/gen-x-millennials-cancer-increase

Unfortunately, it just became more common for me.