Lung cancer prevention

Lung cancer continues to exact a huge toll on the health status of Americans and people worldwide. In the United States (US), the number of new lung cancer cases diagnosed per year has reached epidemic proportions. In 2008, an estimated 215,020 new cases of lung cancer were diagnosed, representing 15% of the 1,437,180 new cases of all cancers diagnosed in 2008 (Jemal et al. 2008). While prostate cancer and breast cancer lead in the number of new cancer cases in American men and women, lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer-related death for both men and women, with an estimated 161,840 of all 565,650 cancer deaths, representing 28.6% of all cancer cases attributable to lung cancer. While once thought to be mainly a man's disease, lung cancer is now represented in a nearly equal fashion between the sexes, with women diagnosed with lung cancer in 2008 representing a full 47% of all new lung cancer cases (Jemal et al. 2008).