Care to quote some sources to support that assertion ? You might want to read this:
Prostate cancer - UK incidence statistics
Prostate cancer is strongly age related so prevalence will increase in an aging population, while incidence will increase simply as a function of increased medical intervention. There have been increased observed numbers of prostate cancer occurence but that is no indication that susceptibility has increased, and as the numbers are flattening out, increased suceptibility seems improbable.
IVI
Thanks for the Prostate Cancer data IVI. But I'm surprised by your reading of it. To quote from it:
Although
there has been a huge rise in prostate cancer incidence over the last 20 years, this has not been reflected in mortality rates.
Much of the increase in incidence can be attributed to the incidental discovery of prostate cancers following
transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP) and, more recently, the use of
prostate specific antigen (PSA) testing.
So: it is not disputed that there has been a huge rise in prostate cancer incidence in the last 20-30 years. The page notes that "much" of the increased incidence "can" be attributed to improved detection, but just as when this argument is advanced in relation to autism, it is no more than speculation without supporting data indicating how, why, and
by how much the detection rates contributed to the dramatic increase in incidence. Unfortunately, the page does not appear to put any numbers on this hypothesised "improved detection" explanation for the dramatic rise in the rates of prostate cancer, nor indeed have I ever seen a numerical supporting argument for any such speculation in the past.
This reminds me of the "hygiene hypothesis" for the rise in the rates of allergies - another case where the more convenient and less troubling explanation for an apparent epidemic can become well-known and accepted, not only in the medical and scientific communities, but in the population at large, with no requirement for any hard evidence whatsoever to be advanced in support of that explanation. Note that any supporting evidence for the hygiene hypothesis - if it existed - would be highly unlikely to be able to distinguish between (a) the possibility that "cleaner childhood environments" were the cause of the modern crisis facing the human immune system, and (b) the possibility that synthetic chemicals in the cleaning products themselves were responsible for the effect. But I digress...
In the UK, European age-standardised rates rose from 62 per 100,000 men in 1993 to 94 per 100,000 in 2001, an increase of 52%. However, since 2001 the rates have only increased by 4% with the numbers of cases diagnosed rising from 32,624 to 37,051 in 2008.
"However, since 2001 the rates have only increased by 4% with the numbers of cases diagnosed rising from 32,624 to 37,051 in 2008" - this is an interesting quote because a rise from 32,624 to 37,051 is a 13.5% rise, not a 4% rise, by my calculations, and even as a per annum rate I can't think where the 4% figure came from.
Between 1975 and 2008 the number of cases in Great Britain more than quadrupled from 8,042 in 1975 to 36,089 in 2008.
The rates have almost trebled from 33 per 100,000 in 1975 to 98 per 100,000 in 2008.
1-4 During the late 1970s and 1980s rates rose consistently, with an acceleration of the trend in the early 1990s followed by a brief levelling off in the mid-1990s and then another rising trend in the late 1990s. Over the same period prostate cancer mortality rates have remained relatively static.
The underlined quote is basically what Currer said initially, so it seems that the reference fully supports that assertion. Figure 1.6 supports Currer's assertion that the rise has affected all age groups. So it seems that the reference backs up everything Currer said: Prostate cancer rates have indeed tripled in all age groups in the last thirty years.
So: rates of prostate cancer have roughly trebled from 1975 to 2008, roughly doubled between 1993 and 2001, and the rise in rates flattened off somewhat since 2001.
The graphs in Figures 1.5 and 1.6 are interesting, showing the pattern of the increase since 1975. Noticeable from those graphs:
- the underlying trend of the graph seems to have already been gradually increasing between 1975 and 1981, amongst older men especially.
- the rate seems to increase sharply around 1990.
- in about 1995, the rate in older men seems to decline sharply, while continuing to rise - now more sharply - in younger men.
Figure 1.7 illustrates the increased rates of TURP and PSA testing in Scotland. This graph, illustrating the increased rate of testing and discovery of prostate cancer, seems to be the only evidence advanced to support the hypothesis that the increased rate is purely attributable to improved detection. It does appear to fit the graphs of the rise in rates of PC reasonably well, since the rates begin to rise sharply in about 1989 when PSA testing is introduced. It may perhaps also explain the decline in rates amongst older men since 1995, if men in that age bracket benefited from earlier detection a decade earlier. However, I'd like to see a much more detailed analysis of the expected impact of these detection rate effects on the overall rate - which should be easily calculable - before reaching any conclusions from these graphs.
It's perhaps worth pointing out that the case for XMRV being a 'contaminant' is at present largely founded on the evidence of Coffin et al. who claim that XMRV is a novel human retrovirus engineered accidentally in the lab in about 1992, through common laboratory processes, and spread around the world as a widespread contaminant via as-yet unknown vectors.
When the "case against" XMRV states that XMRV is the type of novel human retrovirus that has been created accidentally in the laboratory, using a common laboratory process, and that it has been spread around the world's laboratories through an unknown mechanism, and that this sort of "contamination" and creation of novel human retroviruses is now so common and widespread that it is a well-known problem in virology research, and nothing remarkable, and there is 'no evidence' that the retrovirus is associated with human disease....then this is not exactly reassuring.
Anyway, since XMRV was apparently lab-created some time around 1990, and since the evidence for its association with prostate cancer remains quite strong, laboratory-created retroviruses in general seem to me at least as strong a candidate as improved detection rates to explain the sharp rise in prostate cancer incidence between 1990 and 2001.
