TIME TRENDS IN UPPER ALIMENTARY TRACT CANCER RATES AND ALCOHOL AND TOBACCO CONSUMPTION IN AUSTRALIA

Abstract

Alcohol consumption and tobacco smoking, particularly when combined, increase the incidence of cancers of the mouth, pharynx and oesophagus. Earlier analyses showed an upturn in mortality from these cancers since the 1950s in Australia, following a sustained upturn in consumption of both alcohol and tobacco from the 1930s onwards. In view of, first, the increase over recent decades in smoking by women relative to smoking in men, and, second, the slight downturn in per capita consumption of alcohol and tobacco since the mid‐1970s, it is of public health importance to examine recent trends in these cancers. Age‐specific mortality data are presented for 1910–86, supplemented by incidence data for South Australia for 1977–86. Mortality from mouth cancer has continued to increase above age 45 in both men and women, but has fallen recently at younger ages. Mortality from pharyngeal cancer has increased a little, most recently in women. The incidence of mouth and pharyngeal cancers combined has increased very slightly over the past decade, except in younger men. Oesophageal cancer mortality has plateaued in men, and is now falling in women below age 65; the incidence appears to still be rising in older women. 1988 Public Health Association of Australia Show more