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Article: Lung Cancer; Overview.
- Article from:
- NWHRC Health Center - Lung Cancer
- Article date:
- March 16, 2005
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 National Women's Health Resource Center. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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For many years, it was a man's disease. Lung cancer now is the most common cancer-related cause of death among men and women alike. In 1987, lung cancer surpassed breast cancer to become the leading cause of cancer death among U.S. women.
In 2003 there were about 169,400 new cases of lung cancer in the U.S. accounting for about 13 percent of all cancers: 90,200 among men and 79,200 among women. According to the American Cancer Society, this amounted to approximately 154,900 deaths: 89,200 men and 65,700 women.
Lung cancer occurs most often in people over 50 who have long histories of cigarette smoking. The incidence of lung cancer in women as a whole has ...