Socioeconomic differences in cancer incidence and mortality

This chapter summarizes accumulated data on the presence, magnitude and consistency of socioeconomic differentials in mortality and incidence of all malignant neoplasms and 24 individual types of neoplasms in 37 populations in 21 countries. More or less consistent excess risks in men in lower social strata were observed for all respiratory cancers (nose, larynx and lung) and cancers of the oral cavity and pharynx, oesophagus, stomach, and, with a number of exceptions, liver, as well as for all malignancies taken together. For women, low-class excesses were consistently encountered for cancers of the oesophagus, stomach, cervix uteri and, less consistently, liver. Men in higher social strata displayed excesses of colon and brain cancers and skin melanoma. In the two Latin American populations for which data were available, lung cancer was more frequent in higher social strata. Excesses in high female socioeconomic strata were seen in most populations for cancers of the colon, breast and ovary and for skin melanoma. Longitudinal data from England and Wales suggested widening over time of social class differences in men for all cancers combined and for cancers of the lung, larynx and stomach, and in women for all cancers combined and for cervical cancer.