Estimates of cancer incidence and mortality in Europe in 2008

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejca.2009.12.014Get rights and content

Abstract

Up-to-date statistics on cancer occurrence and outcome are essential for the planning and evaluation of programmes for cancer control. Since the relevant information for 2008 is not generally available as yet, we used statistical models to estimate incidence and mortality data for 25 cancers in 40 European countries (grouped and individually) in 2008. The calculations are based on published data. If not collected, national rates were estimated from national mortality data and incidence and mortality data provided by local cancer registries of the same or neighbouring country. The estimated 2008 rates were applied to the corresponding country population estimates for 2008 to obtain an estimate of the numbers of cancer cases and deaths in Europe in 2008.

There were an estimated 3.2 million new cases of cancer and 1.7 million deaths from cancer in 2008. The most common cancers were colorectal cancers (436,000 cases, 13.6% of the total), breast cancer (421,000, 13.1%), lung cancer (391,000, 12.2%) and prostate cancer (382,000, 11.9%). The most common causes of death from cancer were lung cancer (342,000 deaths, 19.9% of the total), colorectal cancer (212,000 deaths, 12.3%), breast cancer (129,000, 7.5%) and stomach cancer (117,000, 6.8%).

Introduction

Accurate statistics on cancer occurrence and outcome are essential both for the purposes of research (into causes, prevention and treatment of cancer) and for the planning and evaluation of programmes for cancer control.1, 2 Several agencies have published statistics on cancer mortality and incidence in the countries of Europe (the EUROSTAT and WHO, for example3, 4). The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), through its programme of collaboration with the cancer registries of Europe in the European Network of Cancer Registries (ENCR) has done so since 1980.5, 6, 7

In the provision of observed incidence and mortality rates, there is an inherent delay between the moment when the event occurs and the time when it becomes available for annual reporting. However, for purposes of planning public health policies, it is important to know the most up-to-date cancer burden in absolute terms. Statistical models, based on the most recently observed data available and subjected to certain assumptions may be used to overcome the lack of current figures.

In this paper, we provide estimates of the incidence of and mortality from 25 cancers in forty European countries in 2008, using the most recent data published in international studies coordinated by the IARC, statistics published by national cancer registries on the Internet and the WHO mortality database.8 Since, at the time of writing, no countries had completed processing and publishing rates of cancer incidence and mortality for 2008 (except France9), we generated short-term predictions whenever possible. Additional estimation was required where national incidence data were not available, by using incidence and mortality data from local (sub-national) cancer registries in the same country.

The results are presented for the 27 countries of the European Union, the European Economic Area (EEA) plus Switzerland, for four areas of Europe as defined by the UN (Central and Eastern, Northern, Southern and Western)10 and for the whole of Europe. Here we present a summary of the results; the complete set of estimates by sex, age-group, cancer and country will be made available at the ECO web site11 and in the forthcoming update of GLOBOCAN12 for the year 2008.

Section snippets

Data sources and methods

Estimates of cancer incidence and mortality for 2008 are made for each of the thirty-nine European countries (as defined by the United Nations10), and Cyprus. The source of the incidence and mortality data together with a summary of the methods of estimation are shown in Table 1. Results are presented for the following cancer sites defined by the 10th edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10)13: oral cavity and pharynx (ICD-10 C00–14), oesophagus (C15), stomach (C16),

Results

Table 2 and Fig. 2 summarise the estimated numbers of cases and deaths in Europe in 2008 (in thousands), by type of cancer.

There were an estimated 3.2 million cancer (excluding non-melanoma skin cancers) cases diagnosed, 53% (1.7 million) occurring in men and 47% (1.5 million) in women. The most common forms of cancers were colorectal cancers (436,000 cases, 13.6% of all cancer cases), followed by breast cancer (421,000, 13.1%), lung cancer (391,000, 12.2%) and prostate cancer (382,000, 11.9%).

Discussion

Short term prediction methods have been used to prepare estimates of incidence and mortality in 2008 from the most recently available data – specifically, national mortality rates for the years 2004–2007, and national incidence rates for 2002–2007, depending on the country. Although predictions are based on trends in historical data which may not continue into the future, they will be accurate when the disease rates show clear stable trend (incidence and mortality from stomach cancer for

Conflict of interest statement

None declared.

Acknowledgements

This work was conducted in the framework of the European Cancer Observatory (ECO), a project of the International Agency for Research on Cancer, funded by the Cancéropôle Lyon Auvergne Rhône-Alpes (CLARA) and by the Directorate General for Health and Consumers of the European Commission.

References (52)

  • World Health Organization. National cancer control programmes. Policies and managerial guidelines. 2nd ed. Geneva: WHO;...
  • Facts and Figures on Cancer in the EU. Health-EU. The public health portal of the European Union. EUROSTAT,...
  • World Health Organization. Programmes and projects: Cancer,...
  • O.M. Jensen et al.

    Cancer in the European Community and its member states

    Eur J Cancer

    (1990)
  • World Health Organization (WHO) Databank. Geneva, Switzerland: WHO Statistical Information System,...
  • Hospices Civils de Lyon/Institut de Veille Sanitaire/Institut National du Cancer/Francim/Institut National de la Santé...
  • United Nations, Population division. World Population Prospects, the 2006 revision, <http://www.un.org/> [accessed...
  • ECO. European Cancer Observatory. Lyon: International Agency for Research on Cancer, <http://eu-cancer.iarc.fr>; 2009...
  • Ferlay J, Bray B, Pisani P, Parkin DM. GLOBOCAN 2002: cancer incidence, mortality and prevalence worldwide. IARC...
  • WHO International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems. Tenth Revision, vol. 2. Geneva,...
  • Nordpred. A software for predicting trends in cancer incidence,...
  • T. Dyba et al.

    Comparison of different approaches to incidence prediction based on simple interpolation techniques

    Stat Med

    (2000)
  • Doll R, Payne P, Waterhouse J, editors. Cancer incidence in five continents: A technical report. Berlin, Germany:...
  • J.M. Lutz et al.

    The impact of coding process on observed cancer mortality trends in Switzerland

    Eur J Cancer Prev

    (2004)
  • Sant M, Allemani C, Santaquilani M, Knijn A, Marchesi F, Capocaccia R. EUROCARE-4. Survival of cancer patients...
  • European Network of Cancer Registries. EUROCIM version 4.0. European mortality database V2.4 (2003), Lyon...
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text