Smoking Associated Cancer Mortality Trends in Select Countries

The objective of this paper was to examine potential factors contributing to smoking-related cancer mortality trends.Smoking associated cancer mortality data from 1970 to 2016 was extracted from the IARC Cancer Mortality Database and WHO Mortality Database.Data from the United States, Greece, Norway, Chile, and Colombia were analyzed due to variance in annual cigarette consumption per capita, the prevalence of current tobacco use, and geographical similarity.Norwegian males, Chilean males and females, and Colombian males and females saw decreases in cancer mortality rates during the study period; on the other hand, Greek males and females showed unchanged mortality rates, and Norwegian females showed a very slight increase in cancer mortality rates.United States age-standardized mortality rates (ASR) rose from 180.75 deaths per 100,000 persons in the year 1970 to the early 1980s before showing a steady and significant decline to 90.46 deaths per 100,000 persons in 2016.This study shows a strong correlation in developed countries (United States, Norway, and Greece) between advances in cancer therapies, early detection techniques, health screening, and public and legal health initiatives with a decrease in smoking-related cancer mortality rates.In developing countries (Chile and Colombia), widespread H. pylori testing, and treatment advances were found to be the main drivers of decreasing cancer mortality rates.