Childhood cancer mortality has fallen significantly in the US, but disparities have emerged, CDC report shows

A research released on Thursday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that although the death rate from cancer among children in the US is a quarter lower than it was twenty years ago, the declines haven’t been equal for all populations.

In 2021, there were 2.1 cancer deaths for every 100,000 children under the age of 20, which represented a 24% decrease from the rate of about 2.8 in 2001, according to the report.

Between 2001 and 2011, cancer death rates decreased at similar rates for Black, White, and Hispanic children, and there was no significant gap in mortality. However, in the following decade, the decline in rates continued only for White children. In 2021, the cancer death rate among White children was approximately 20% lower than that of Black or Hispanic children, as reported by the CDC.

The report also revealed that childhood cancer mortality decreased across all age groups between 2001 and 2011, but the significant decline persisted only among children under the age of 10 between 2011 and 2021. Nonetheless, the cancer death rate among teenagers, who historically had a higher mortality rate than younger children, was 23% lower in 2021 compared to 2001.

Leukemia death rates, which used to be the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in children in the United States, were almost halved between 2001 and 2021.

Since then, brain cancer has emerged as the primary cause of cancer mortality in children, accounting for about 25% of all cancer-related fatalities in people under the age of 20.

According to CDC data, cancer was the fourth most common cause of death for children in the US between the ages of one and nineteen.