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Global Cancer Cases Set to Reach 34 Million a Year by 2050

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A new American Cancer Society and WHO analysis projects a 67% rise in annual cancer cases by 2050, with 21 million diagnosed and 9.8 million dead in 2024.

Nearly 21 million people were diagnosed with cancer around the world in 2024, and 9.8 million died from it, according to a wide-ranging new analysis led by the American Cancer Society (ACS). The report warns that the annual number of new cases could reach 34 million by 2050 - a 67% jump from 2024 - driven entirely by growing and aging populations.

The findings, published as Global Cancer Statistics, 2026, estimate that roughly one in five people worldwide will be diagnosed with cancer at some stage of their lives. About one in nine men and one in 13 women are expected to die from the disease. The study was carried out by researchers at ACS and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the World Health Organization's dedicated cancer agency, and appears in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, the ACS flagship journal, with the report also posted on cancer.org.

Dr. Hyuna Sung, senior principal scientist for cancer surveillance at ACS and the report's lead author, framed the disease as one of the defining public health problems of the century and a leading obstacle to longer lives. Mapping where and how heavily cancer strikes, she said, is critical to directing prevention and treatment efforts fairly. She added that the scale of the burden, while sobering, also signals opportunity: close to half of all cancer deaths could be averted by tackling changeable risk factors, and a further large share could be prevented through earlier detection and prompt care.

The projections rest on GLOBOCAN estimates for 2024, an IARC database that records cancer incidence and deaths across 34 types of the disease in 186 countries. The team analysed how diagnoses and deaths differ by region and by a country's Human Development Index, then applied demographic trends to forecast the load in 2050.

Sharp gaps between regions

The geography of cancer is deeply uneven. Incidence rates ranged by four to five times between regions, with Australia and New Zealand recording the highest and parts of Africa and South-Central Asia the lowest. Death rates diverged less sharply - by roughly two times - but the pattern still varied by place and sex. The heaviest mortality fell on men in Eastern Europe and on women in Melanesia.

Lung cancer remained the most common malignancy worldwide and the deadliest, with tobacco still the primary cause. Almost 2.6 million new lung cancer cases were logged in 2024, making up 13% of all cancers, and the disease killed 1.9 million people - 19% of every cancer death recorded that year.

Breast cancer's uneven toll

Female breast cancer was the second most frequently diagnosed cancer overall, with about 2.4 million new cases and 694,000 deaths. Among women it topped the list for both new diagnoses and deaths.

The survival numbers expose a stark divide. Women in Western Africa are twice as likely to die of breast cancer as women in Australia and New Zealand, even though the disease is diagnosed only about half as often in Western Africa. The gap points to unequal access to screening and treatment rather than to how widespread the disease is.

Colorectal cancer ranked third for new diagnoses and second for deaths, with more than 2.0 million cases and 918,000 deaths. Liver cancer added 843,000 new cases and 732,000 deaths to the global tally.

Taken together, the report presents both a warning and an argument for action: much of the coming rise is fixed by demography, but a large slice of the deaths is not, provided prevention, testing and care reach the people who need them most.

global cancer statistics 2026, cancer cases 2050, American Cancer Society, lung cancer worldwide, breast cancer mortality, GLOBOCAN 2024, cancer prevention, IARC WH

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