Survival from prostate cancer in England and Wales up to 2001

Within the last 10 years, prostate cancer has become the most common malignancy among men in England and Wales. The age-standardised incidence rate exceeded that for colorectal cancer by 1993, and overtook the (declining) rate for lung cancer in 1999 ( Quinn et al, 2001 ). By the early 2000s, approximately 29 000 men were diagnosed each year with prostate cancer, accounting for one in four of all new cancers in men (excluding nonmelanoma skin cancer). Prostate cancer is rare under the age of 50 years, but incidence rises steeply with age, reaching nearly 1000 cases per 100 000 per year (1% annual risk) in men aged 85 years and more. Each year, there are some 9000 deaths from prostate cancer, approximately one in eight of all cancer deaths in men ( Office for National Statistics, 2003 ).