Australian cancer study finds rising incidence across later-born cohorts

A descriptive-analytic study published in BMC Medicine examined Australian trends in nine cancer types previously associated with early-onset increases, using lung cancer, cervical cancer and melanoma as comparators. Researchers applied age-period-cohort modelling to aggregate, publicly available incidence data from 1982–2021 and mortality data from 1971–2023 to distinguish patterns associated with age, calendar period and birth cohort.

Increasing incidence cohort effects were identified for colorectal, liver, pancreatic and thyroid cancers in both sexes, uterine cancer in women and prostate cancer in men. The largest relative increases were for pancreatic cancer in women and thyroid cancer in men, although numerical effect estimates were not provided in the supplied text. Cohort effects declined for melanoma and cervical cancer in women, with no substantial birth-cohort differences for lung or oesophageal cancer. Incidence period effects were relatively stable after adjustment for cohort effects, except for prostate and cervical cancers.

Mortality period and cohort effects generally declined. Exceptions included increasing mortality period effects for thyroid and pancreatic cancers, and for cervical and uterine cancers in women. The findings suggest possible generational differences in cancer risk factors, but this aggregate observational analysis cannot establish which exposures explain the trends or demonstrate causation. The supplied text does not report case counts or uncertainty estimates. Authors declared no competing interests.