For the first time, more Canadians are dying from cancer than from major cardiovascular diseases.
Statistics Canada reported on Tuesday that 69,503 people died of major cardiovascular diseases in 2007, compared with 69,595 people who died of cancer the same year. The diseases accounted for 59 per cent of all deaths in Canada in 2007.
While the difference may seem small, it reflects a shift that has been occurring in Canada for at least a decade - and sends a message that more needs to be done to prevent new cancer cases.
Deaths from cardiovascular disease have been gradually declining in Canada over the past few years, in major part because of improvements in treatment and effective public-education campaigns encouraging Canadians to adopt healthy lifestyles and be on the lookout for signs of problems.
At the same time, the number of people dying from cancer has continued to increase. Part of the rise may be due to the fact that Canadians are living longer, potentially making it more likely that they will develop cancer in old age, in addition to improvements in making accurate diagnoses.
But experts say the shift also reflects the need for better prevention campaigns, more research to find new treatments and improved cancer screening. "We certainly have a lot more work to do in the area of cancer," said Prithwish De, an epidemiologist with the Canadian Cancer Society. "There's a number of different areas that need to be addressed."
The Statistics Canada report, which uses the most recently available mortality statistics from across the country, found important gender differences in the most common causes of mortality. Among men, the number of cancer deaths exceeded major heart-disease deaths in 2005, whereas more women are still dying from cardiovascular disease than they are of cancer.
Public-health experts have spent years trying to highlight the fact that cardiovascular disease is a major, but often overlooked, killer of women. New public-education campaigns have been launched in recent years encouraging women to monitor their heart health, but the Statscan report indicates that more work is required.