Over 20 years in the USA, the mortality of children and adolescents from cancer has decreased by 24%
Between 2001 and 2021, the cancer death rate among children and youth under the age of 19 in the United States decreased by 24%.
This is reported by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States (CDC). The death rate decreased from 2.75 to 2.10 cases per 100,000 people. The findings are based on data from the National Vital Statistics System, which tracks deaths in the United States.
Brain cancer was the most common type of cancer causing death in this age group in 2021. Its death rate was 23% higher than that of leukemia and twice that of bone cancer.
Until 2001, leukemia was the most dangerous form of cancer for this age group. Since then, the death rate from leukemia among young people has decreased by 47%.
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Stephen Skapec, MD, medical director of the Gill Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders at Children’s Health, told NBC News that the development of immunotherapy may explain the decline in leukemia deaths.
But the decline did not occur among all age and demographic groups. During the years 2011-2021, a “significant” decrease in the death rate was observed only in light-skinned children under the age of 9, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States.
The cancer death rate in 2021 was 2.38 cases per 100,000 people for black youth, 2.36 for Hispanic youth and 1.99 for light-skinned youth, the CDC notes.
“You can have the most advanced scientific achievements, but if we cannot bring them to every community in the same way, then we have not achieved our purpose as a nation.” Sharon Castellino, MD, pediatric cancer specialist at the Winship Cancer Institute at Emory University (Atlanta), summarized the results of the decline in various demographic groups in an Associated Press comment.
We will remind you that earlier we talked about how and where to get medical help when a child is diagnosed with cancer.
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