The share of American adults who smoke has fallen from 42.4 percent in 1965 to 9.9 percent in 2024, the lowest level on record.
The breast cancer death rate among women has fallen 44 percent since 1989, and the colorectal cancer death rate has nearly halved since 1990.
For cancer that has spread in the body, five-year survival has more than doubled since the mid-1990s, from 17 to 36 percent.
The cancer death rate in the US fell 35 percent between 1991 and 2024. That equals more than 4.8 million cancer deaths averted. The figures come from the annual Cancer Progress Report from the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), a US research organization. This is the 16th edition of the report.
According to the report, the decline is largely due to fewer people smoking. This has led to fewer deaths from lung cancer. Progress has sped up thanks to better methods for detecting cancer early and better treatments. The share of American adults who smoke cigarettes has fallen from 42.4 percent in 1965 to 9.9 percent in 2024. That is the lowest level on record.
Lung, colorectal and breast cancer
Between 2015 and 2024, the lung cancer death rate fell by an average of 4.2 percent per year. For colorectal cancer, the decline was 1.3 percent per year. For breast cancer in women, it was 1.2 percent per year.
Over longer periods, the changes are large. The breast cancer death rate among women has fallen 44 percent since 1989. That equals about 546,000 fewer deaths. The report attributes this to screening mammography and treatments personalized for each patient. The colorectal cancer death rate has nearly halved since 1990.
Seven in ten are alive after five years
For people diagnosed with cancer in the mid-1970s, five-year survival was 49 percent. For those diagnosed between 2016 and 2022, it was 71 percent.
Survival has also risen for cancer that has spread to other parts of the body. In the mid-1990s, 17 percent of these patients were alive five years after diagnosis. Between 2016 and 2022, the share was 36 percent. For metastatic lung cancer, five-year survival rose from 2 to 10 percent. For metastatic melanoma, a type of skin cancer, it rose from 16 to 34 percent, and for metastatic rectal cancer from 8 to 19 percent.
Several individual cancer types show the same pattern. Five-year survival for the blood cancer chronic myeloid leukemia has risen from 22 percent in the mid-1970s to 71 percent. For multiple myeloma, a cancer of the bone marrow, it has doubled from 32 to 64 percent since the mid-1990s.
Children and adolescents
Among children up to age 14, five-year survival has risen from 58 to 86 percent since the mid-1970s. Among adolescents ages 15 to 19, it has risen from 68 to 88 percent. We have previously written that cancer mortality among US children under five fell 84 percent from the 1950s to 2021.
Gaps between groups in the US have also narrowed. In a separate report, AACR shows that the cancer death rate was 34 percent higher among Black Americans than among White Americans in 1991. In 2024, the gap was 9 percent.
18.6 million cancer survivors
At the start of 2025, more than 18.6 million people living in the US had a history of cancer. That is 5.5 percent of the population. In 1971, there were about 3 million. The number is expected to exceed 22 million by 2035.
Eleven new drugs in one year
Between July 2025 and June 2026, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved eleven new cancer drugs. Ten of them are molecularly targeted. That means they attack specific changes in the cancer cells. According to AACR's press release, they include the first immune checkpoint inhibitor for ovarian cancer and the first CAR T-cell therapy for marginal zone lymphoma. They also include the first PROTAC drug for breast cancer. It makes the cancer cell break down a protein that it needs to grow. Checkpoint inhibitors are now approved for 23 different cancer types.
Five drugs that were already on the market were approved for new uses. The FDA also approved a wearable device that treats pancreatic cancer noninvasively, a kit for collecting your own HPV sample at home and several AI tools for detecting cancer early.
The HPV test is used to detect the virus that causes cervical cancer. In England, the HPV vaccine has meant that no woman aged 20 to 24 died of cervical cancer between 2020 and 2024.
Swedish study on AI and mammography
The report also highlights the Swedish MASAI trial from Lund University. About 106,000 women took part. When AI helped review the mammograms, there were 12 percent fewer so-called interval cancers, meaning cancers found between two screenings. At the same time, radiologists spent 44 percent less time reviewing the images.
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