[Prediction of economic burden caused by thyroid cancer in China, 2025-2034]

Objective: To evaluate the incidence and overdiagnosis of thyroid cancer and related socioeconomic burden in China, from 2025 to 2034, estimate the direct and indirect economic burdens, and provide evidence for public health policy development. Methods: The morbidity and mortality data of thyroid cancer in China during 2009-2018 and the estimated data of the United Nations were used to predict the disease burden of thyroid cancer in China from 2025 to 2034 with Bayesian age-period-cohort model. Publicly available data of average hospitalization cost, per capita gross domestic product, productivity growth rate, employment rate, and amount of consumer price index increase were used to predict the economic burden by using cost-of-illness method and friction cost method. A one-way sensitivity analysis was conducted to evaluate the robustness of the results. Results: From 2025 to 2034, the newly diagnosed thyroid cancer case count would increase from 529 656 to 1 619 485, with overdiagnosed case count rising from 431 336 to 1 312 720. The death count would increase from 14 366 to 32 644. The direct economic burden of thyroid cancer would indrease from 8.04 billion Yuan to 24.58 billion Yuan, while the total economic burden would increase from 8.67 billion Yuan to 27.11 billion Yuan. In 2025, the economic burden attributed to overdiagnosis was estimated to be 7.00 billion Yuan, accounting for approximately 80.73% of the total annual burden. The sensitivity analysis indicated that hospitalization cost and the discount rate had substantial impacts on the results. Conclusion: Thyroid cancer would continue to cause substantial health and economic burdens in China between 2025 and 2034.