Lung cancer in non-smokers: women less affected than men

Non-smoking women are less likely than men to die from lung cancer, according to results of a new study published in the "Journal of the National Cancer Institute", which calls into question an idea and recently mentioned the Atlantic
Although rare, the number of deaths from lung cancer among non-smokers is estimated in the United States about 15,000. Passive smoking, consumption of tobacco products other than cigarettes and exposure to other known such as asbestos, radon or radiation carcinogens are known as risk factors for this cancer, remember Dr. Michael Thun and his colleagues at the American Cancer Society.

Few studies have examined the impact of age, sex and ethnicity on the incidence of lung cancer and mortality among non-smokers, researchers have conducted research with more than 940,000 adults enrolled in two cohort studies on cancer prevention, the first between 1959 and 1972, the second between 1982 and 2000.

The results show that the mortality rate from lung cancer is higher in men than in non-smoking women. Nevertheless, researchers observed an increase in the rate among women aged 70 to 84 years and a shift in men 35 to 69 years. For Dr. Thun, "this reflects the fact that women are significantly more likely than men to have never smoked at the age of 60 years and more."

They also found a disparity between African Americans and Caucasian Americans non-smokers, the former having a much higher risk (58% for men, 43% for women) than the second die a lung cancer.

The limitations of this study are, however, that the authors are not able to determine whether the observed differences between men and women on the one hand, and African-Americans and Caucasian Americans on the other hand, reflect differences in the incidence of lung cancer among non-smokers, survival or misdiagnosis, they emphasize.

They nevertheless conclude that the "results are reassuring for women who have never smoked and who could care following recent publications indicating that their risk was actually higher than it actually is" .