More Than 650,000 Cancer Deaths Avoided?

[Guest guest]

From: Info01@...(Jon Barron)

In this issue, Jon examines the latest study from the American Cancer

Society that claims that better medical care has saved 650,000 lives

from cancer over the last 20 years. If only it were true.

Cancer - 650,000 Lives Miscalculated

by Jon Barron

On May 27th, the American Cancer Society announced that 650,400 U.S.

cancer deaths were avoided from the early 1990s through 2005. The

headline on their release was Cancer Death Rates Steadily Declining. As

might be expected, the media promptly picked up the story, and ran it

over and over again with virtually identical headlines:

More Than 650000 Cancer Deaths Avoided

More Than 650,000 Cancer Deaths Avoided

Etc.

If you read the stories, you learned tidbits of information such as:

The decline in cancer death rates has been greater for some groups than

for others

People with more education generally had bigger declines in their cancer

death rates

Access to cancer screening and medical care is part of the reason for

that discrepancy

But overall, what you learned from reading the story or listening to it

on the news is that 650,000 lives have been saved over the last 15 years

and that the drop is driven in large part by better prevention,

increased use of early detection practices, and improved treatments for

cancer.

This is thrilling, exciting, and, oh yes, absolutely unsupported by the

evidence at hand. To learn the real story, read the complete newsletter

at:

http://www.jonbarron.org/baseline-health-program/2009-06-08.php.