Breast Cancer Survival Rates Are On The Rise
But African-American women black are still experiencing death rates nearly 40 percent higher than white women.
The San Diego Union-Tribune:
Breast Cancer Deaths Continue To Decline But Racial Disparities Persist
Since 1989, advances in early detection and treatment have decreased the national death rate by 39 percent though experts still predict that breast cancer will kill more than 40,000 American women in 2017. And, though they have seen significant increases in survival over the same span, black women still experienced death rates nearly 40 percent higher than white women did in 2015, the most recent year for which national data is available. ...Dr. Maria Elena Martinez, co-lead of the Reducing Cancer Disparities Program at UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center, said that both nature and nurture are driving the trend.
On the nature side, African-American women, Martinez explained, are more likely to develop types of breast cancer that are not responsive to hormone therapy which has made major contributions to the survivability gains made in recent years.