An ecological study of cancer incidence and mortality rates in France with respect to latitude, an index for vitamin D production

Figures & data

Figure 1 All cancer less lung cancer vs. latitude. Shown are data for females in the United States,55 1950–69 (dots) and females in France,11 1998–2000 (squares).

Table 1 Regression results for breast and colorectal cancer6 with respect to latitude

Cancer	Sex	Year	Incidence (r, p)	Mortality (r, p)
Breast	F	1985	0.53, 0.01
		1990	0.62, 0.002
		1992	0.65, 0.002	0.69, 0.001
		1995	0.62, 0.003
Colorectal	M	1985	0.54, 0.01
		1990	0.56, 0.008
		1992	0.56, 0.008	0.53, 0.01
		1995	0.56, 0.008
	F	1985	0.74, 0.000
		1990	0.72, 0.000
		1992	0.65, 0.001	0.46, 0.04
		1995	0.49, 0.02

F, female; M, male.

Table 2 Regression results for cancer mortality rates for 1998–200011 vs. latitude x latitude

Cancer	Sex	Incidence rate (r, adjusted R^2, p)	Mortality rate (r, adjusted R^2, p)
All	M	0.86, 0.73*	0.80, 0.65*
	F	0.79, 0.60*	0.78, 0.59*
All less lung	M	0.83, 0.67*	0.78, 0.30*
	F	0.79, 0.60*	0.76, 0.55*
Breast	F	0.60, 0.33, 0.004	0.66, 0.40, 0.001
Colorectal	M	0.50, 0.21, 0.02	0.49, 0.20, 0.02
	F	0.66, 0.40, 0.001	0.65, 0.39, 0.001
Esophageal	M	0.86, 0.72*	0.81, 0.64*
	F	-	0.64, 0.38, 0.002
Lung	M	0.71, 0.48*	0.54, 0.25, 0.01
	F	NS	NS
Prostate	M	0.64, 0.37, 0.002	0.68, 0.44, 0.001
Uterine, cervix	F	0.60, 0.32, 0.004
Uterine, corpus	F	0.71, 0.32, 0.004	0.64, 0.37, 0.002

* p < 0.001; F, female; inc, incidence rate; M, male; NS, not significant.

Table 3 Ratio of high latitude to low latitude regression fit for cancer data for 1998–200011

Cancer	Male incidence	Male mortality	Female incidence	Female mortality
Breast			1.32	1.29
Cervical			1.42
Colorectal	1.20	1.18	1.24	1.21
Esophageal	2.74	2.04	1.91
Lung	1.64	1.51	NS	NS
Prostate	1.26	1.25
Uterine corpus			1.38
Uterine cervical + corpus				1.32
All	1.42	1.30	1.24	1.16
All less lung	1.40	1.28	1.23	1.15

NS, not significant.

Devesa SS, Grauman DJ, Blot WJ, Pennello GA, Hoover RN, Fraumeni JF Jr. Atlas of Cancer Mortality in the United States 1950–1994 1999; June 13, 2010 NIH Publication No. 99-4564 http://www3.cancer.gov/atlasplus/new.html

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