Africa: Economic development equals more cancer

Information released by the American Cancer Society (ACS) on the eve of World Cancer Day last Friday warns that lifestyle cancers of the lung, breast and colon – which are in turn related to economic development - will continue to rise in developing countries if preventative measures are not widely applied. The findings are contained in the ACS reports - Global Cancer Facts & Figures and Global Cancer Statistics - and include a special section on cancer in Africa, where according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) about 681,000 new cancer cases and 512,400 cancer deaths occurred in 2008.