Children Lung Cancer

Protect Your Children from Lung Cancer
By Janie Jonah

In 2004 the UK alone had 153,397 deaths caused by cancer alone. Every year around 38,000 cases of lung cancer are diagnosed in the UK alone.The total population in the UK around that time was estimated at 60.2 million people. A closer look will reveal the true extent of the disease that is slowly being tackled by research. Cancer cases are increasing by 1% per year. Cancer mainly effects people in later life, but is also seen to develop in children and adolescents. More than 75% of deaths from cancer occur in the elderly from the age of 65 and above. With such a high rate of deaths occurring in the elderly, cancer is responsible for 1 in 4 or 25% of all deaths across all age groups throughout the world. This figure is highest in adults under 65 years old, where 1 in every 3, or 33%, of all deaths are caused by cancer.

There are more than 200 different types of cancer but only four of these types were responsible for 48% of all cancer related deaths. Lung cancer was the single biggest type of cancer diagnosed which accounts for 22% of all cancer deaths in 2004. Bowel, breast and prostate cancer were responsible for between 11% and 8% of other cancer deaths. Why is the rate of lung cancer sufferers so high? Simply because of the number of people who smoke cigarettes. Around 80% of all lung cancer deaths are caused by smoking.