Women catching up to men in lung cancer deaths

From the University of Michigan this week: Lung cancer is the No. 1 cancer-related killer in the United States. And while men are more likely to die from lung cancer than women, the trend is starting to change. “If you add up the number of people in the United States who die of breast cancer, prostate cancer, colon cancer and pancreatic cancer, the number of people who die of lung cancer is greater than all of those combined,� says Gregory Kalemkerian, M.D.. “Almost twice as many American women die from lung cancer every year than from breast cancer. I think that statistic says it all: Women are at high risk for developing lung cancer, particularly those women who smoke, and there is a greater risk of dying from lung cancer than from breast cancer,� Kalemkerian adds. The lesson: Stop smoking. Any time you look at the risks in lung cancer, it’s dominated by smoking: 90 percent of people who get lung cancer are smokers or former smokers.