New research suggests that 40 percent of cancer cases and half of all adult cancer deaths in America could be prevented, highlighting the urgent need for improved preventive measures.

According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 1.8 million new cancer cases are diagnosed each year in the United States, resulting in about 600,000 deaths. While cancer can affect anyone, various environmental and lifestyle factors significantly increase the risk of developing the disease.

The society’s latest study underscores that hundreds of thousands of cancer cases could be prevented by addressing modifiable risk factors. Researchers analyzed nationally representative data to determine the proportion of cancer cases and deaths linked to factors that can be modified, such as smoking, secondhand smoke exposure, excess body weight, alcohol use, poor diet, physical inactivity, ultraviolet radiation, and infections from cancer-causing viruses like HPV.

Their findings reveal that in 2019 alone, 713,340 cancer cases and 262,120 cancer deaths among American adults over 30 years old were attributable to these modifiable risk factors and could have been prevented. Cigarette smoking emerged as the leading cause, responsible for 56 percent of all potentially preventable cancers in men and 39.9 percent in women.

“Despite considerable declines in smoking prevalence during the past few decades, the number of lung cancer deaths attributable to cigarette smoking in the United States is alarming,” said the senior scientific director of cancer disparity research at the American Cancer Society and lead author of the report, Farhad Islami.

“This finding underscores the importance of implementing comprehensive tobacco control policies in each state to promote smoking cessation, as well as heightened efforts to increase screening for early detection of lung cancer, when treatment could be more effective,” Mr. Islami added.