Avoidable Causes of Childhood Cancer

"The Increasing Incidence
but Decreasing Mortality
Rates Of Major Childhod
Cancers, 1975-2009*
SITE % Increase
Incidence
% Decrease
Mortality**
Overall 35 53
Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia 58 70
Bone & Joint 57 33
Brain & Nervous System 52 33
Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma 40 75
Leukemia 33 65
Kidney (Wilm’s Tumor) 20 0
* National Cancer Institute, Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results, 2011.
** The striking decrease in mortality reflects the National Cancer Institute’s success
in developing pediatric clinical trial cooperative groups in 2000. (The Cancer
Letter, June 8, 2012).
Association with
Congenital Defects
Several childhood cancers occur so early in life that they must have
originated during fetal life, or shortly thereafter.* These include acute
lymphocytic leukemia, neuroblastoma,**and kidney and liver cancers. Cancer
in the mother, particularly melanoma, can spread to the infant.
* MILLER, R.W. Journal of the National Cancer Institute. 40; 1079-1085, 1968.
** The author is a survivor of this cancer"