PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — According to a new report from the American Cancer Society on breast cancer statistics for 2024, mortality rates are down overall due to progress in treatment and early diagnosis. Some demographics, however, have seen more cases than others.
According to the ACS study, this year there will be over 300,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer in the U.S. and over 42,000 women are expected to die from the disease. But the good news is that, from 1989 to 2022, the death rate from breast cancer dropped by 44%. That translates to an estimated 518,000 fewer U.S. breast cancer deaths during that span.
“In 1975, the overall survival rate for breast cancer was 75%, and now we're well over 90% survival rates for breast cancer,” said Dr. Arnold Baskies, board chair of the American Cancer Society of Greater Philadelphia. “So we've made a tremendous amount of progress over that period of time.”
Still, Baskies said not all women have benefited from the advancements. “In terms of Asian Americans and Pacific Islander women, they have seen the steepest increase in both premenopausal and postmenopausal breast cancer rates,” he said.
According to the study, there will be over 300,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer this year, and over 42,000 women are expected to die from the disease.
Breast cancer in AAPI women under 50 has increased by 50% since 2000, and Black women continue to have a 38% higher breast cancer mortality rate than white women. Mortality rates have also remained consistent among Indigenous women over the last three decades.
Baskies said, to get a handle on those disparities there are a number of areas to attack.
“Access to care is the No. 1 issue that we can do something about. The science behind [whether] there's a genetic issue also has to be addressed,” he said, “and then the issues of obesity and environmental causes for breast cancer have to be looked at, also.”