Lung cancer in women bucks national trend
New research shows Australian women are dying from lung cancer at increasing rates, defying a trend towards lower death rates for all other cancers and strengthening the case for plain packaging of tobacco products, Cancer Council Australia has said.
Commenting on the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s newly released Cancer in Australia 2010, Cancer Council Australia CEO, Professor Ian Olver, said the report reflected Australia’s successes in controlling cancer but also showed where we could do better.
“Cancer survival in Australia is high by international standards, but our successes are not shared equitably,” Professor Olver said. “There are, however, policy measures available to government for reducing many of the disparities and addressing alarming trends.”
Professor Olver said key findings in the report should provide a guide to improved cancer control policy at the national level included:
The aberrant trend towards higher rates of lung cancer death in women. The Government’s visionary plan to introduce plain packaging of tobacco products has the potential to significantly reduce smoking rates (and subsequent lung cancer deaths), hence the tobacco industry’s trenchant opposition to the plan;
Significantly higher cancer deaths in men than in women (57% v 43%), a gap reflected in bowel cancer mortality. With the future of the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program, which could save up to 30 lives a week (more than half of them male) subject to 2011-12 budget considerations, the Government is uniquely placed to immediately cut male cancer deaths with a single program; and Australia’s unwanted status as the world’s melanoma capital – with rates 13 times the global average. Yet Australian Government investment in skin cancer campaigns has declined since 2007-08, despite independent research showing its effectiveness.
Professor Olver said inequitable cancer outcomes were also reported among Australians in remote areas, who should receive improved travel and accommodation assistance when diagnosed with cancer, as well as other disadvantaged groups such as Indigenous people.
“The issue of cancer in Indigenous people is complex and under-researched, but higher rates of smoking are likely to be one reason for the disproportionate level of cancer mortality,” he said.
“So the Government should be commended for its Close the Gap initiatives, particularly the substantial planned investment in tobacco control.”
