While cancer is the No.1 health concern of Americans, many are unaware of cancer risk factors or choose not to follow important cancer prevention messages, according to a survey by Discovery Health Channel and the American Cancer Society. Americans tend to focus on family history and disregard age as one of the most powerful cancer risk factors, particularly with regard to when cancer screenings should be obtained.
ACS recommends a cancer-related checkup every three years for people aged 20-39 and every year for people who are age 40 and older.
The survey sheds light on the areas where cancer education is most needed. For instance, the survey found that:
- 67% of Americans do not know that men are at a higher lifetime risk of developing cancer in general than women.
- 68% think that a non-smoker living in a heavily polluted city has the same chance of getting lung cancer as a smoker living in a city with little or no pollution.
- 70% do not know African-Americans are more likely to develop cancer than persons of any other racial or ethnic group.
Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates in Washington, D.C., was commissioned to conduct the poll last summer of 514 adults nationwide.
(Discovery Health, Annie Howell, 301/771-4799)