A report by the nation's leading cancer organizations released Tuesday showed the first decline in 10 years in the incidence of new cases of cancer for both men and women. The report was compiled by the National Cancer Institute of the government-funded US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and released online. The decrease was driven largely by declines in some of the most common types of cancer, according to the report. The death rate from cancer has been in steady decline over the past years. The annual report on the status of cancer has been issued since 1998. Tuesday's report, which covers the years from 1975 to 2005, also noted large state and regional differences in lung cancer trends among women, which it said pointed to the "need to strengthen many state tobacco control programmes." "Based on the long-term incidence trend, rates for all cancers combined decreased 0.8 per cent per year from 1999 through 2005 for both sexes combined," the report was quoted as disclosing by DPA. But the rate decreased faster for men, by 1.8 per cent per year from 2001 through 2005. For women, the incidence of new cancers dropped only 0.6 per cent a year from 1998 through 2005 for women. The declines were mainly among the three most common cancers among men - lung, colon/rectum, and prostate - and the two most common cancers among women, breast and colon/rectum cancer.
