Global cancer researchers have warned that breast cancer diagnoses and deaths are expected to surge worldwide in the coming decades, rising to more than 3m new cases every year.
EuroNews reports that most breast cancer cases are detected in midlife or later. But in a recent study, the researchers found that in Africa, 47% of cases occurred among women under 50-years-old, compared with 18% in North America, 19% in Europe and 22% in Oceania.
Globally, in 2022, 2.3m women were diagnosed with breast cancer and 670 000 died. One in 20 women will be diagnosed during their lifetime, making it the most common form of cancer for women, said the experts.
By 2050, global breast cancer deaths are expected to climb by 68%, while new cases will rise by 38%, according to the new projections from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the World Health Organisation (WHO).
That would amount to 3.2m new cases and 1.1m deaths every year.
“Every minute, four women are diagnosed with breast cancer worldwide and one woman dies from the disease – and these statistics are worsening,” said Dr Joanne Kim, an IARC scientist and one of the study’s authors.
Developing countries will be disproportionately burdened, the agency warned.
Yet while death rates have fallen in recent years in Cuba and 29 wealthy countries, only seven countries are meeting global health goals to curb deaths by at least 2.5% each year, the report found.
That includes Malta, Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, Lithuania, the Netherlands, and Slovenia. A handful of others are close behind: Norway, Sweden, Ireland, Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand.
If all countries met the 2.5% reduction goal, the number of breast cancer deaths would be nearly halved by 2050, according to the study, which was published in the journal Nature Medicine.
Notably, overall breast cancer incidence rates were highest in Australia and New Zealand, followed by Northern America and Northern Europe, potentially due to risk factors like alcohol consumption and lower exercise levels.
In Europe, the lifetime risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer ranges from 4.9% in Ukraine to 11.1% in France.
The risk of dying from the disease ranges from 1.1% in Norway and Spain to 2.6% in Montenegro.
Mortality is much higher in developing countries – particularly the Pacific Island regions known as Melanesia and Polynesia as well as in Western Africa – reflecting a lack of access to early cancer detection, diagnosis, and treatment, the report found.
In wealthy countries, 17% of women who are diagnosed with breast cancer eventually die from the disease. In developing countries, it’s 56%.
Kim said that governments and other groups can help improve breast cancer outcomes by “investing in early detection and treatment”, which could “save millions of lives in the coming decades”.
Study details
Global patterns and trends in breast cancer incidence and mortality across 185 countries
Joanne Kim, Andrew Harper, Valerie McCormack et al.
Published in Nature Medicine on 24 February 2025
Abstract
Updates of current and projected estimates of the burden are critical to monitoring the success of ongoing efforts in breast cancer control, such as the World Health Organisation Global Breast Cancer Initiative, which aims to reduce breast cancer mortality by 2.5% per year. We investigated the current (2022) and future (2050) global burden of female breast cancer overall, and by age group, in 185 countries using the GLOBOCAN database, and 10-year trends in incidence and mortality rates in 50 and 46 countries, respectively, using the Cancer Incidence in Five Continents plus and World Health Organisation mortality databases. Globally, 2.3 million new cases and 670,000 deaths from female breast cancer occurred in 2022. Annual rates increased by 1–5% in half of examined countries. Mortality rates decreased in 29 countries with very high Human Development Index (HDI), and seven countries (for example, Belgium and Denmark) are meeting the Global Breast Cancer Initiative goal of at least a 2.5% decrease each year. By 2050, new cases and deaths will have increased by 38% and 68%, respectively, disproportionately impacting low-HDI countries. High-quality cancer and vital status data, and continued progress in early diagnosis and access to treatment, are needed in countries with low and medium HDI to address inequities and monitor cancer control goals.
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