Respiratory tract cancers: lung and mesothelioma.

The trend analysis of lung cancer in the database of the Italian Network of Cancer Registries (pool AIRT), showed, among males (52,267 incident cases and 46, 726 deaths included in the study) a statistically significant decrease of incidence and mortality in the period 1986-1997; incidence rates decreased by about 1.4%/year and mortality rates by about 1.6%/year. Among females, lung cancer trends are rather different from that of males, according to diverging trends in tobacco smoking exposures; in fact, both incidence (+1.2%/year) and mortality (+0.9%/year) are increasing. Incidence of mesothelioma (1594 cases), showed for the period 1986-1997, a statistically significant increase among both males and females; standardised rates increased, more than 4% every year. As regards to deaths due to pleural malignant cancers (1393 among males and 664 among females) their trend was stable in the analysed period.