American Cancer Society Study Finds Colorectal Cancer Mortality
Dropping Slower in African Americans For distant stage,
decreases were 32.6 percent versus 4.6 percent ATLANTA –
December 22, 2011 – A new study finds that while colorectal
cancer mortality rates dropped in the most recent two decades
for every stage in both African Americans and whites, the
decreases were smaller for African Americans, particularly for
distant stage disease. The authors say concerted efforts to
prevent or detect colorectal cancer at earlier stages in blacks
could improve worsening black-white disparities. Before 1980,
colorectal cancer mortality rates for African Americans were
lower than those for whites. Since then, however, the pattern of
CRC mortality rates has reversed and diverged, so that in 2007,
the rate for African Americans was 44 percent higher than for
whites. This worsening disparity in mortality rates coincided
with the introduction and dissemination of screening and
improved treatment for colorectal cancer. Studi