Overview
- The Annals of Internal Medicine study analyzed annual cancer incidence from 2003 to 2017 across 42 countries using IARC’s GLOBOCAN data.
- In more than three quarters of countries, adults aged 20 to 49 saw increases in thyroid, breast, colorectal, kidney, endometrial, and leukemia diagnoses.
- Older adults experienced similar increases for five of those cancers, with colorectal cancer not following the same pattern.
- Colorectal cancer rose faster in younger adults in roughly 69 to 70 percent of countries, while liver, oral, esophageal, and stomach cancers declined for younger people in most places.
- The authors attribute the cross-age rises to obesity-related risks and caution against focusing research solely on younger adults, noting data are limited to high- and middle-income countries through 2017.