The American Cancer Society has released key findings from Cancer Statistics 2025 and its consumer-friendly companion, Cancer Facts & Figures 2025. The report, published annually since 1951, is considered the gold standard for cancer surveillance information, with timely cancer findings to help improve the lives of people with cancer.
This year’s report shows the cancer mortality rate declined by 34% from 1991 to 2022 in the United States, averting approximately 4.5 million deaths. However, this steady progress is jeopardized by increasing incidence for many cancer types, especially among women and younger adults, shifting the burden of disease. For example, incidence rates in women 50-64 years of age have surpassed those in men, and rates in women under 50 are now 82% higher than their male counterparts, up from 51% in 2002. This pattern includes lung cancer, which is now higher in women than in men among people younger than 65 years. These important findings are published Jan. 16 in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, alongside Cancer Facts & Figures 2025, available on cancer.org.
“Continued reductions in cancer mortality because of drops in smoking, better treatment, and earlier detection is certainly great news,” said Rebecca Siegel, senior scientific director, surveillance research at the American Cancer Society and lead author of the report. “However, this progress is tempered by rising incidence in young and middle-aged women, who are often the family caregivers, and a shifting cancer burden from men to women, harkening back to the early 1900s when cancer was more common in women.”
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Overall, in 2025, there will be an estimated 2,041,910 new cancer diagnoses in the US (5,600 each day) and 618,120 cancer deaths. In addition to projecting the contemporary cancer burden, ACS researchers compiled the most recent findings on population-based cancer occurrence and outcomes using incidence data collected by central cancer registries (through 2021) and mortality data collected by the National Center for Health Statistics (through 2022).
The report also highlights lagging progress against pancreatic cancer, which is the third leading cause of cancer death in the US. Both incidence and mortality rates are increasing, and the five-year survival rate is just 8% for the 9 out of 10 people diagnosed with pancreatic exocrine tumors.
Other highlights from the report include:
Despite overall declines in cancer mortality, death rates are increasing for cancers of the oral cavity, pancreas, uterine corpus, and liver (female).
Additionally, alarming inequalities in cancer mortality persist, with rates in Native American people 2-3 times higher than White people for kidney, liver, stomach, and cervical cancers. Black people are twice as likely to die of prostate, stomach, and uterine corpus cancers compared to White people and 50% more likely to die from cervical cancer, which is preventable.
Incidence rates continue to climb for common cancers, including breast (female), prostate (steepest increase at 3% per year from 2014-2021), pancreatic, uterine corpus, melanoma (female), liver (female), and oral cancers associated with the human papillomavirus.
The rate of new diagnoses of colorectal cancer in men and women younger than 65 years of age and cervical cancer in women (30-44 years of age) has also increased. Notably, lung cancer incidence in women under 65 years of age surpassed men for the first time in 2021 (15.7 versus 15.4 per 100,000 people).
Cancer incidence in children (14 years of age and younger) declined in recent years after decades of increase but continued to rise among adolescents (ages 15-19 years). Mortality rates have dropped by 70% in children and by 63% in adolescents since 1970, largely because of improved treatment for leukemia.
Quick facts about ACS Cancer Facts & Figures
- Since 1951, Cancer Facts & Figures has been the public’s go-to resource for timely cancer information. This annual report provides the most current information about cancer.
- The audience for the publication extends not just nationwide, but globally, and equips health professionals, educators, policymakers, patients, and others with crucial findings.
- Once a stand-alone publication, Cancer Facts & Figures is now the flagship work in a highly regarded series of nine reports under the purview of the Surveillance and Health Equity Science team. Updating each report is about a 6-month collaboration between renowned cancer experts from ACS and other top research institutions across the country.
- Each Cancer Facts & Figures report is published with a companion article in the ACS journal, CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.
- A unique feature of Cancer Facts & Figures is their state-specific data: the publications break down projections by state and at the national level.
- ACS Cancer Facts & Figures publications are downloaded on average about 9,000 per month or about 300 times every single day.
