Your Chance of Dying from Cancer

The number of new cancer cases worldwide is expected to increase by 50% over the next 20 years, partly because poor nations are adopting unhealthy Western habits, the World Health Organization (WHO) said. "The overall message is that we can prevent a third of cancers," said Australian cancer specialist Bernard Stewart, one of the report's principal editors.

Worldwide, about 10 million people are diagnosed with cancer every year and 6 million people die from it. The report projects that the annual number of diagnoses will reach 15 million by 2020, based on current trends in smoking, diet and exercise.

Rich nations have more cancer than poor ones, mostly because of tumors tied to bad habits such as smoking and drinking, eating too much or the wrong kinds of foods, and lack of exercise. "I think what we can do is slow down the increase. Anything more is not realistic," said Kleihues, director of WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer.

However, officials are especially concerned about the trend toward unhealthy lifestyles in the developing world, where early detection and treatment of cancer is not as good as in rich nations. In developing countries, 80 percent of cancer patients die, compared with 50 percent in rich nations.

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" It's quite disturbing. Many of them are taking up smoking and striving to get the Western lifestyle. That's very hard to stop. They will unfortunately miss this unique chance of maintaining a low cancer burden," Kleihues said.

The report attempts to condense the wealth of knowledge about cancer into one book, offering governments an important resource in their efforts to tackle the disease. WHO plans to update the 350-page cancer report every few years.