Breast cancer statistics - Key Facts

• Breast cancer is now the most common cancer in the UK.
• The lifetime risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer is 1 in 8 for women in the UK.
• In the UK in 2009 more than 48,400 women were diagnosed with breast cancer, that’s around 133 women a day.
• Around 370 men in the UK were diagnosed with breast cancer in 2009.
• Female breast cancer incidence rates in Britain have increased by almost 70% since the mid-1970s.
• In the last ten years, female breast cancer incidence rates in the UK have increased by 6%.
• More than 8 in 10 breast cancers are diagnosed in women aged 50 and over.
• In the UK in 2009/2010 the NHS breast screening programmes detected almost 16,500 cases of breast cancer.
• In the European Union (EU-27) more than 332,000 new cases of breast cancer were diagnosed in 2008.
• Worldwide, around 1.38 million women were diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008.

Read more in-depth breast cancer incidence statistics.

section updated 10/05/12

• Breast cancer survival rates have been improving for forty years. More women are surviving breast cancer than ever before.
• In the 1970s around 5 out of 10 women with breast cancer survived the disease beyond five years. Now it's more than 8 out of 10.
• Women diagnosed with breast cancer are now twice as likely to survive their disease for at least ten years than those diagnosed forty years ago.
• More than three-quarters of women diagnosed with breast cancer now survive their disease for at least ten years or more.
• Almost 2 out of 3 women with breast cancer now survive their disease beyond 20 years.
• Breast cancer survival rates are significantly higher among women from the most affluent areas compared to women living in the most deprived areas.
• Breast cancer survival rates are better the earlier the cancer is diagnosed.
• Around 9 out of 10 of women diagnosed with stage I breast cancer survive the disease beyond five years. This drops to around 1 out of 10 diagnosed with stage IV.

Read more in-depth breast cancer survival statistics.

section updated 10/05/12

• In 2010 in the UK around 11,550 women died from breast cancer, that's around 32 every day.
• Around 75 men died from breast cancer in the UK in 2010.
• In 2010 in the UK more than 1,150 deaths from breast cancer occurred in women aged under 50.
• Since peaking in the late 1980s breast cancer death rates have fallen by almost 40% in the UK.
• In the last ten years death rates for breast cancer in the UK have fallen by almost a fifth.
• In the UK breast cancer is now the second most common cause of death from cancer in women after lung cancer.
• More than half of breast cancer deaths in the UK are in women aged over 70.
• In the European Union (EU-27) , around 89,000 women died from breast cancer in 2008.
• Worldwide an estimated 458,000 women died from breast cancer in 2008.

Read more in-depth breast cancer mortality statistics

section updated 10/05/12

• Mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes increase breast cancer risk, although these gene faults are rare and account for a small proportion of cases.
• Women with a mother, sister or daughter diagnosed with breast cancer have almost double the risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer themselves.
• Risk increases with the number of first-degree relatives diagnosed with breast cancer, but even so, eight out of nine breast cancers occur in women without a family history of breast cancer.
• Being obese increases risk of postmenopausal breast cancer by up to 30%.
• More than 4,000 cases of breast cancer in the UK are linked to excess bodyweight.
• Women currently using hormone replacement therapy (HRT) have a 66% increased risk of breast cancer.
• Use of HRT has fallen in the UK in recent years, although around 3% of breast cancer cases in the UK are linked to its use.
• The risk of breast cancer in current users of oral contraceptives (OC) is increased by around a quarter but only 1% of all the breast cancer cases in the UK are linked to OC use.
• Drinking moderate amounts of alcohol increases the risk of breast cancer - and risk increases the more someone drinks. Around 3,100 cases of breast cancer in the UK are linked to alcohol consumption.
• A more active lifestyle reduces breast cancer risk. Around 1,700 cases of breast cancer in the UK are linked to being physically inactive.

Read more in depth breast cancer risk factors.

section updated 10/05/12

*age-standardised to the European population

More in depth breast cancer statistics can be found using these links: incidence, survival, mortality, risk factors and screening.

section updated 10/05/12