About the study findings:

• India reported 1,23,907 new cases of cervical cancer and 77,348 deaths, according to the study.

Countries:

• Though the incidence of cervical cancer has decreased in many parts of the world —notably in Latin America, Asia, Western Europe, and North America — over the past three decades, the burden remains high in many low- and middle-income countries.
• The study found major declines in cases in Latin American countries including Brazil, Colombia, and Costa Rica; Asian nations like India, Thailand, and South Korea; and Poland, Slovenia, and the Czech Republic in Eastern Europe.
• Countries with the largest average declines in incidence rates per year include Brazil (8%), Slovenia (7%), Kuwait (7%), and Chile (6%).
• The highest increases in rates were seen in Latvia (4%), Japan (3%), Ireland (3%), Sweden (3%), Norway (2%), Northern Ireland (2%), Estonia (2%), and China (2%).

Database:

• The study used the International Agency for Research on Cancer’s (IARC) Global Cancer Observatory (GLOBOCAN) 2020 database to estimate the burden of cervical cancer incidence and mortality rates in 185 countries.

Incidence:

• In 2020, overall incidence was 13 per 1,00,000 women; mortality was 7 per 1,00,000 women.
• As many as 172 out of the 185 countries saw more than the 4 cases per 1,00,000 women per year threshold for elimination set by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
• The development of effective vaccination against the human papilloma virus (HPV), which causes cervical cancer, and screening programmes have made cervical cancer a largely preventable disease.

Target:

• In 2020, the WHO announced a target to accelerate the elimination of the disease as a public health problem, aiming to reduce incidence to less than 4 cases per 1,00,000 women per year in every country by 2030.