IARC says 70 percent of lung cancer cases in people who have never smoked are adenocarcinoma. Photo: Reuters File Photo
The rate of cancer cases in people who have never smoked is increasing. Air pollution is considered a significant factor in this. The IARC, the World Health Organization’s cancer research agency, has reported these data.
According to IARC, lung cancer in never-smokers is now considered the fifth highest cause of cancer death worldwide.
The IARC says that lung cancer in people who have never smoked is mainly adenocarcinoma (a type of lung cancer). Adenocarcinoma is the main one of the four subtypes of lung cancer.
An IARC study published in the Lancet Respiratory Medicine journal said that in 2022, about 200,000 people were exposed to air pollution and developed adenocarcinoma.
According to the study, the association of air pollution with adenocarcinoma was found to be higher in East Asia, especially in China.
The study’s lead author, Freddie Bray, head of the IARC’s cancer surveillance branch, told the Guardian that the results of the study suggest that the risk of lung cancer is changing and that more research is needed to identify other possible causes, such as air pollution, if smoking is not the main cause of lung cancer.
A significant number of people around the world are affected by lung cancer. In 2022, about 2.5 million people were diagnosed with lung cancer.
The four main types of lung cancer are adenocarcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, small cell carcinoma and large cell carcinoma. The IARC says that adenocarcinoma is the main type in both men and women.
In 2022, 45.6 percent of men and 59.7 percent of women diagnosed with cancer had the adenocarcinoma subtype. In 2020, the rate was 39 percent for men and 57.1 percent for women.
The IARC says that 70 percent of people who have never smoked and who have developed lung cancer have adenocarcinoma.
While the rate of lung cancer in men has decreased in most countries over the past 40 years, the trend of women being affected has been steadily increasing.
The majority of people diagnosed with lung cancer are still men (about 1.6 million as of 2022). However, the gap between the rates of lung cancer in women and men is narrowing. In 2022, nearly 900,000 women were diagnosed with lung cancer.
A report published in the Guardian in 2023 said that for the first time in the UK, the number of women diagnosed with lung cancer had exceeded the number of men. At that time, women were advised to be vigilant about lung cancer, just as they were about breast cancer.
Cancer experts say that just as women should get tested if they feel a lump in their breasts, they should also be alert to the symptoms of lung cancer.
The percentage of people who have never smoked in the world who are diagnosed with lung cancer is not known. There is only evidence that this trend is increasing. Scientists are trying to find out what other causes of lung cancer are, besides smoking.
