More cancer cases by aging population in Germany

The number of people newly diagnosed with cancer is rising at an alarming rate in the ten years between 2000 and 2010, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) said on Monday in Berlin. According to new calculations by RKI, 252,400 men and 224,900 women were diagnosed with cancer in Germany in 2010. The number of new cancer cases among men has increased by 21 percent between 2000 and 2010 and by 14 percent among women. The RKI cited ageing as a major contributor to the rising number of cancer patients. The age-standardized incidence rates show that there would be no increase of cancer cases without the demographic change among men. Among women, there would have been only an increase of about 7 percent without the demographic change. Prostate cancer is the most common diagnosis among men cancer patients, followed by lung cancer, and in women breast cancer is the most common one, followed by bowel cancer. For 2014, RKI researchers expect that about half a million people, of which approximately 236,000 women, would be diagnosed with cancer in Germany.