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UK Kidney Cancer mortality statistics

This page presents kidney cancer mortality statistics including, by age, trends over time and variations across the EU.

In the UK, kidney cancer is the ninth most common cause of cancer death in men and the thirteenth in women. 3,777 people died from kidney cancer in 2006, accounting for just over 2% of all cancer deaths in the UK.

The number of deaths and the mortality rates for kidney cancer in the UK and its constituent countries in 2006 are shown in Table 2.1.1-3

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Kidney cancer mortality by age and sex

Kidney cancer death rates rise with increasing age and most deaths (80% of male deaths and 87% of female deaths) occur after the age of 60 (Figure 2.1).1-3

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Kidney cancer mortality trends over time

Kidney cancer mortality rates for both men and women have increased since the early 1970s (Figure 2.2).

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Male kidney cancer rates have shown a steady rise from around 4.3 per 100,000 in 1971 to around 6.5 per 100,000 in 2006, an increase of 52%. Female rates have increased by 40% over the same time period from 2.1 to 2.9 per 100,000. The male:female ratio of age standardised rates has remained fairly constant at about 2.3:1. During the last five years, rates appear to be stabilising.

When rates are examined by age, (Figure 2.3and 2.4) it is clear that the largest increases in mortality since 1971 were in men and women aged over 65, reflecting the incidence trends. The older age groups have experienced increases of more than 50%. For men and women aged 85 and older, death rates from kidney cancer more than doubled between 1971 and 2006, from 23.8 to 70.3 per 100,000 for men and from 12.8 to 31.9 per 100,000 for women.

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When mortality from kidney cancer is analysed by birth cohort, there are increases in death rates for those born up to the mid 1920s, a levelling off for those born from the 1930s to the early 1950s, and for subsequent birth cohorts there is a fall in mortality. This may mean in future that overall mortality rates will decline in the UK.4

Such a decline has already occurred in some northern European countries, for example, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway during the last two decades of the twentieth century.5 The pattern of kidney cancer mortality by birth-cohort in Europe resembles that for lung cancer and for both cancers smoking is the primary risk factor.5

Kidney cancer mortality in countries of the EU

Figure 2.5 shows estimates of kidney cancer mortality across the countries of the EU.

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References for kidney cancer mortality

1. Office for National Statistics, 2008 Mortality Statistics: Cause, 2006
2. ISD Online, 2008 Cancer Incidence and Mortality data, 2006
3. Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency 2008 Northern Ireland Mortality data, 2006.
4. Quinn, M., et al., Vol. SMPS No. 66. 2001: TSO. Cancer Trends in England & Wales 1950-1999.
5. Perez-Farinos, N., G. Lopez-Abente, and R. Pastor-Barriuso,Time trend and age-period-cohort effect on kidney cancer mortality in Europe, 1981-2000. BMC Public Health, 2006. 6: p. 119

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