UK Cancer survival rates trail 10 years behind other European countries

The Concord-2 global study looked at survival rates in 67 countries for patients diagnosed with lung, breast, colon and stomach cancers in 1995 to 1999, compared with levels in 2005 to 2009.
It acknowledged there had been improvements in rates in the UK, where cancer survival has doubled in the last 40 years, but not enough to catch up with levels achieved in many European countries a decade earlier. Macmillan found that by comparison UK cancer survival rates were “stuck in the 1990s”. One of the most stark examples was lung cancer, which only 7% of patients survived in the 1990s in the UK. The rate improved to 10% a decade later but this was still behind a 14% survival rate achieved in Austria in the 1990s. By the 2000s 18% of patients diagnosed with lung cancer in Austria survived, almost twice the rate in the UK. Five other European countries (Finland, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway) also recorded better survival rates for lung cancer in the 1990s than Britain in the 2000s. A similar pattern emerged for breast cancer. In the past decade the survival rate was 81% in the UK, a level exceeded 10 years before in Sweden, France and Italy. For colon cancer six European countries (Finland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden) had better survival rates in the 1990s than Britain achieved 10 years later. In the 2000s 19% of British patients diagnosed with stomach cancer survived. Better survival rates were recorded a decade earlier in Austria, Germany, Italy, Norway and Sweden. Macmillan said the figures showed that much better survival rates were achievable in the UK. Its chief executive, Lynda Thomas, said: “Because UK cancer survival rates are lagging so far behind the rest of Europe, people are dying needlessly. Frankly, this is shameful. If countries like Sweden, France, Finland and Austria can achieve these rates, then the UK can and should, bridge the gap.”