Ageing Hong Kong’s grim cancer numbers will rise, but there’s a silver lining: survival rates are improving, early detection helps
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Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide, and in Hong Kong, the latest data is grim. The Hong Kong Cancer Registry says new cases recorded in 2017 showed the highest year-on-year increase in about 10 years, continuing a rising trend over the past three decades.
There were 33,075 new cases in 2017, a 5.1 per cent rise from the previous year.
Cancer is Hong Kong’s No 1 killer, accounting for more than 30 per cent of all deaths and rising at an annual rate of 1.5 per cent over the past decade. Other leading causes of death in 2017 were pneumonia, heart disease and brain disease.
The 2017 statistics indicate that cancer will strike about one in four men and one in five women by the age of 75. As for fatalities, about one in nine men and one in 15 women will eventually die from cancer by the age of 75.
Globally, cancer is the second leading cause of death after heart disease and stroke. Cancer was estimated to be blamed for 9.6 million deaths in 2018, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Although Hong Kong’s latest cancer numbers appear alarming, medical experts say the upwards trend is not unexpected and cancer promises to place a heavy medical burden in a rapidly ageing and growing society.