By 2050, 35 million people will be diagnosed with cancer every year. That is almost twice as much as now. The World Health Organization (WHO) is sending this gloomy message to the world today. Why will their numbers increase so quickly? And what about the number of cancer cases in Belgium?
The new WHO report does not paint an optimistic picture. According to the organization, the number of cancer patients in the world will have increased by 75 percent in 25 years. By then, 35 million people will develop cancer per year compared to ‘only’ 20 million now.
Moreover, the forecast is even worse for developing countries. In the least developed countries, such as Mali and South Sudan, the number of cases would increase by as much as 142 percent. The number of people dying from the disease could even double. “They will bear the full brunt of the global burden of cancer,” it said.
Why the sudden increase?
One of the main causes for the large increase in the number of cancer cases is the Western lifestyle. “Of course, factors such as the increasing aging population and population growth also play a role. But the spread of Western lifestyles should certainly not be underestimated. Obesity, alcohol and tobacco are all key factors in this evolution. Colon cancer is a good example of this. The number of patients with this condition has increased sharply over the past twenty years. Something partly to do with excessive consumption of red meat, a typical characteristic of Western society,” the WHO said.
According to the organization, we should certainly not forget the impact of air pollution. It is not without reason that lung cancer is the most common and deadliest cancer in the world. Nearly one in five cancer deaths is due to lung cancer.
The global top three is further supplemented by breast cancer and colon cancer. Breast cancer affects 2.3 million women and men every year. For colon cancer, that number amounts to more than 1.9 million people.
What about in Belgium?
According to the WHO, more than 80,000 Belgians were diagnosed with cancer for the first time in 2022. About 29,000 Belgians died from the disease that same year. Unlike the rest of the world, lung cancer is not the most common disease in our country. That ‘honor’ is reserved for breast cancer (14%). One in three women who are diagnosed with cancer have breast cancer.
In second place is a typical male cancer: prostate cancer (13%). More than ten thousand men are affected by this every year. Only at number three do we find lung cancer (10.6%). Just over 8,500 Belgians received this diagnosis in 2022. If we divide men and women separately, we see that prostate cancer and breast cancer are number one.
Cancers that are still rare in Belgium are penile cancer, vaginal cancer, gallbladder cancer and cancer of the nasopharynx. Each of these species affects fewer than 100 Belgians annually.
Which cancer is the deadliest?
The cancer that causes the most deaths in our country is lung cancer by a large margin. In 2022, the disease claimed more than 6,000 lives. Colon cancer is in second place, with more than 3,200 deaths. An American study recently showed that young men die most often from this. “I don’t see why Belgium would be an exception to the rule,” intestinal specialist Luc Colemont told our newspaper at the time. Third place is more or less shared between pancreatic cancer and breast cancer. Both cause about 2,300 deaths.
Also read:
Every day 9 Belgians die from colon cancer: what are the symptoms? “You cannot feel that there is a growth in your intestine” (+)
Over 65 and a small belly? That’s not so bad for your health (+)
Half of the world’s population is a carrier of pathogenic stomach bacteria: “There is only one preventive action you can take against it” (+)
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