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THE NUMBER OF cancer diagnoses in Ireland is continuing to rise every year, primarily due to an ageing and growing population.
However, cancer rates appear to have stabilised or even fallen in recent years, once age and population size are taken into account.
The National Cancer Registry’s latest annual report, which has been published today, also shows that more people are surviving cancer.
About 167,700 cancer survivors (previously diagnosed with an invasive cancer other than non-melanoma skin cancer) were estimated to be alive at the end of 2015. That’s the equivalent of 3.6% of the population.
This includes, for the first time, estimates of the numbers of survivors from cancers diagnosed before the Registry was established in 1994.
Donal Buggy, Head of Services and Advocacy at the Irish Cancer Society, said it is “hugely welcome to see that more people are surviving cancer”.
However, he added: “The number of people in Ireland being diagnosed with this disease continues to rise. As such, we are facing into a cancer epidemic.
“If our health system is not properly equipped to deal with this, our ability to deliver the best outcomes for patients will diminish.”
Most common cancers
The six most common cancers represented among the surviving (prevalent) cancer patient population were: breast cancer (24% of all cancer survivors), prostate cancer (20%), colorectal cancer (13%), skin melanoma (7%), non-Hodgkin lymphoma (4%) and lung cancer (3%).
Some 40,570 people in Ireland are diagnosed with cancer or a related tumour each year.
Based on the latest available complete information, it is estimated that 33,180 invasive cancers, or 22,320 cancers excluding the generally non-fatal non-melanoma cancers of skin, were diagnosed annually during the period 2015-2017.
The risk of developing cancer was higher for men than for women, both overall and for most cancer types.
Rates of the top three major cancers in men (prostate, colorectal and lung) are now declining or static.
Rates of female breast cancer have fallen since 2008, though lung cancer rates in women are still rising. The Registry said these trends “broadly reflect a range of public health and early-diagnosis initiatives in Ireland”.
8,770 deaths
Cancer is the second most common cause of death in Ireland after diseases of the circulatory system, and an annual average of about 8,770 deaths from invasive cancer occurred during 2012-2014.
Lung cancer was the leading cause of cancer death in both sexes, accounting for 19% of cancer deaths in women and 23% in men. The risk of dying of cancer was about 34% higher for men than for women.
Overall cancer mortality rates (adjusted for age and population) have continued to fall since 1994, as have mortality rates for most individual cancers. However, mortality rates for liver cancer, melanoma of skin and (in women) lung cancer and uterine cancer continue to increase, reflecting ongoing increases in incidence of these cancers.
Commenting on the figures, Professor Kerri Clough-Gorr, Director of the Registry and Professor of Cancer Epidemiology at University College Cork, said: “As the population grows and ages, and treatment and survival improve, the population of cancer survivors — now estimated to be almost 170,000 people — continues to grow.
“Planning for the long-term support and follow-up needs of cancer survivors is an important health priority, as recognised by the recently published National Cancer Strategy 2017-2026.”
Buggy echoed these sentiments, saying the figures show why “implementing the National Cancer Strategy in full is so important”.
“A cancer diagnosis can have a lasting impact on survivors, from debilitating treatment side-effects to continued mental health issues. Disappointingly, though, such issues have historically been underserved by our health services,” he added.
National Cancer Strategy
The national strategy outlines a comprehensive plan for cancer care in Ireland, which includes increasing the proportion of cancers diagnosed at an earlier stage so that more lives can be saved.
“This vision requires investment to make it a reality. The government needs to ensure that resources are frontloaded and made available early in the Strategy to ensure its recommendations are fully implemented,” Buggy said.
Responding to today’s report, Health Minister Simon Harris said he is “delighted to see a reduction in the incidence of cancer”.
“The figures in the report highlight the need for additional support for patients living with and beyond cancer – an issue that is highlighted in the National Cancer Strategy 2017-2026. I am delighted to have secured additional funding for 2018 to facilitate the phased implementation of the Cancer Strategy as a key strategic initiative.”
Harris added that the report also reinforces the need to promote cancer prevention measures which offer the most cost-effective, long-term approach for cancer control. “My department and the HSE are continuing to promote healthy lifestyles, through initiatives to reduce tobacco use and through the broader Healthy Ireland programme,” he said.
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Are cancer patients surveyed as to help find the causes of the cancer epidemic, is there work been done on finding out if it’s the food we are eating, is it water we drink, radon areas, microwaves from phones, radio signals, air pollution etc.?
@Macus Mc Mahon: Bear in mind too that according to WHO, booze and fags are class 1 carcinogens.
@Bairéid Rísteard: plenty of non drinkers and non smokers getting cancer too, since that proposal of Bob Mugabee been the goodwill ambassador was suggested by The WHO you couldn’t take anything they say seriously.
@Macus Mc Mahon: Why of course not. Are you suggesting we invest research into cause and prevention of cancer! Ould diet have anything to do with it? Meat, Dairy? IFG-1 hormone increases? Oh don’t be silly. Its all in a persons gene’s nothing to do with diet. The right thing to do is spend time and money on finding new cures for cancer through excellent pharmaceutical intervention and treatment and spend money on raising awareness on cancer.
But then again I could wrong… ;-)
@Macus Mc Mahon: Yes the epidemiology of cancer is pretty well understood, even though there are people who will tell you that you can stop getting it by eating more organic carrots, quinoa or ginkgo biloba (whatever that is) or whatever they’re selling. The problem is a terribly unstable molecule called DNA and it’s first cousins that control cell division and replication and unfortunately there is a proportional error rate. Some of those errors trigger the cells to die, which is OK, others will cause the cells to multiply uncontrollably which is cancer. Evidence for preventing cancer, don’t smoke, exercise more, drink less alcohol. Environmental carcinogens are hodge podge of other tiny risk modifications which really only count as an epidemiological interventions (banning asbestos, limiting organophosphates) rather than increasing your stress by trying to live in a bubble.
@Joe Harbison: I’d argue that eating junk, not exercising drinking, and smoking, is being trapped in a bubble of ignorance.
@Joe Harbison: Oh, and as the man said, Sunscreen
@Macus Mc Mahon: I know and I trusted WHO up until then.
@Bairéid Rísteard: they also added Sunbeds to that category but we still allow them to be used
@Macus Mc Mahon: My mum was diagnosed with breast cancer earlier this year. It was during a routine check up when they noticed a change in the skin on her breast. She’s 66, non smoker or drinker, healthy living and regularly exercises. My husband was diagnosed with a form of skin cancer two years ago. He was 36 at the time. The cancer developed due to over exposure to sun coming in on his neck whilst driving a bus (his job). He’s also a non smoker or drinker. Exercises regularly and we eat relatively healthy food. He knows he got it from sun exposure as other colleagues developed it on the same side of their necks,arms and faces. Thankfully both have been given the all clear.
Leo’s 5 million euros spin team can’t bluff the fact Leo left health with 600,000 on waiting lists and GO reward hos failure & still do even though waiting lists is now past 700,000 & counting and parents and elderly have to beg their dignity away on liveline as they can’t afford buy private insurance to skip public yes public hospital waiting list eith private insurance for their vital operations.
@Jay Lane: FG reward his failure
@Jay Lane: it’s more than FG to blame here. This problem is ongoing for years. Coupled with the fact that we have people living longer, people have higher medical needs/demands than they do 20 years ago, standards of health care IS improving (detecting / monitoring/ operating various illnesses etc. The problem is hospitals and wards were closed, new hospitals weren’t built to meet demand, nurses and drs are graduating and emigrating. This all isn’t Leo’s fault. It’s going back to FF , it’s going back years. It isn’t a quick fix. It won’t be fixed by changing of ministers. It needs a radical change – the HSE needs a complete overhaul
Perhaps if our water wasn’t laced with Flouride ( carsonagenic) things would be better!
@Linda Keneally: Fluoride isn’t a known (or suspected) carcinogen.
If you live long enough you will die of something. The older you get the more likely that something will be Cancer. The rise in cancer deaths is a positive sign, because it means we are eliminating all the other causes of death.
@Clancy: Yes, of course we will, but it seems more and more that people expect to live indefinitely. Illness is the revenue stream for the pharma-medical industry, and old age is huge business. But it is clearly unsustainable, it doesn’t take a genius to work that out. Spend some time in an old-folks home, no-one in their right mind would want to end their days there.
I remember a scene from a book by either Camus or Sartre. A prisoner is facing the death sentence and has the opportunity to get off. But he decides that such a day has to come anyway, and will be exactly the same, whether now or later.
Long life is not necessarily a blessing . . .
@Clancy: I think your forgetting there is a cohort of young patients who are dying myself included who don’t see it that black and white and there are many older people who are in rude Health and would like to continue that way as long as possible except cancer interrupted their plans for a long and happy retirement
Figures, figures, figures. Statistics and more statistics. Is there nobody out there
Interested enough to find out once and for all what’s really causing these cancers and
the reasons for the increase in diagnoses?
@Frankly Mydear: I think the reason for the increase in diagnosis is down to a few things, 1) better public screening for breast and bowel cancer 2) better education, as in more information as regards the importance of self-screening, going for regular medical check-ups, what symptoms to look out for & seek medical help for without delay etc. Of course the BIG question is what are the markers for causing cancer in the first place, especially among younger people, how come 2 people of similar age, with similar lifestyles etc will see one of them getting cancer & the other not? This is a subject I have a huge interest in as my family seems to have had more of it’s share of cancer sufferers over the years, some have survived but sadly some haven’t. Whatever about older people who have lived through most of their lives & have experienced the major milestones that should be everybody’s right, it breaks my heart to see young people battling this disease & not always winning the battle either.
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