Australia has one of the highest rates of breast cancer diagnoses but the mortality rate is falling, according to new research.
A study by University of Sydney, University of Queensland and Alberta Health Services in Canada looked at global breast cancer incidence and death rates in 185 countries.
It found one in 20 women globally were diagnosed with breast cancer, while one in 70 were likely to die from the disease.
“Although a major cancer in females worldwide, the breast cancer burden was not even distributed,” the study said.
“Incidence rates were highest in Australia and New Zealand.”
The National Breast Cancer Foundation said one in seven women in Australia and one in 556 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer over their lifetime.
On average, 58 people will be diagnosed with breast cancer each day.
The study found New Zealanders were also over-represented in the diagnosis figures.
“Female breast cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in Aotearoa New Zealand,” University of Otago epidemiologist Dr Jason Gurney said.
“Kiwi women are diagnosed with this cancer every day, whether through our well-run national screening programme – which tends to find cancers that haven’t caused symptoms yet – or through women presenting to clinical services with symptoms like a suspicious lump.”
The study said while diagnosis rates were high across both Australia and NZ, the mortality rate from breast cancer was falling.
The figures show both countries had reduced their breast cancer mortality by 2.1 per cent a year, in keeping with a World Health Organization initiative aimed at reducing global breast cancer deaths by 2.5 per cent annually.
University of Sydney public health professor Dr Nehmat Houssami, who is an author of the study, said Australia and NZ had likely recorded high diagnosis rates because of several factors.
“There are various reasons for this related to the population structure — for example, aging and risk factor profile,” she said.
“Breast cancer risk factors that women may be less aware of include alcohol consumption, low physical activity, and post-menopausal obesity — so we need to improve support for women to reduce these potentially modifiable risk factors.”
The study found Malta, Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, Lithuania, Netherlands and Slovenia were the only seven countries currently on track to meet the World Health Organization’s goal, but mortality rates had decreased across 30 other countries.
Dr Houssami said the research found the burden of breast cancer diagnosis and mortality was not “spread equally” across countries.
“Countries that are less affluent and have less developed health systems have much worse breast cancer outcomes than the more developed and affluent countries,” she said.
“A woman who develops breast cancer in a low-middle income country has a higher likelihood of dying from her cancer than her counterpart in a high-income country.”
The study said new cases and deaths will increase by 38 per cent and 68 per cent respectively by 2050, and will disproportionately impact low ‘human development index’ countries.
The index is a system developed by the World Health Organization that measures a country’s average achievements in health, knowledge and standard of living.
“High-quality cancer and vital status data, and continued progress in early diagnosis and access to treatment, are needed in countries with low and medium HDI to address inequities and monitor cancer control goals,” the study said.
Dr Houssami said the findings of the study were “not new”.
“These disparities … have become more evident and are predicted to further widen in the future, flagging an urgent need for governments, especially in low-middle income countries, to invest in providing access to breast cancer diagnosis and treatment services,” she said.
The study was released in the Nature Medicine journal, and was peer reviewed.
Its authors were funded by the Canadian Institute of Health, the University of Calgary, Alberta Children’s Hospital Foundation, Alberta Health, the Susan G Komen Foundation, the National Health and Medical Research Council and the National Breast Cancer Foundation.
