The American Cancer Society’s annual report reveals that while overall cancer deaths have fallen, cases among women and young adults are on the rise. The new report said cancer mortality rates have declined 34% from 1991 to 2022 in the U.S. However, cancer rates in women younger than 50 are now a whopping 82% higher than men in that age category, which is a 51% increase since 2002.

Accorduing to CBS News, cancer cases in middle-age women have now surpassed those in men. Young women are nearly twice as likely to be diagnosed with cancer as young men, said the report that was published in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.

"One thing we found out really striking in this report is for an increase in the number of women being diagnosed with cancer, particularly in the 50 to 64 age, compared to men," Dr. William Dahut, chief scientific officer for the American Cancer Society told CBS News. "Seeing this trend over time is certainly concerning and something we need to take a look at."

Experts speculate that the decrease in cancer deaths is likely due to early detection and better treatment. It’s also due to the number of people who have stopped smoking, notes CNN. Increase in cancer rates among women and certain ethnic groups may be due to obesity, genetics and environmental factors.

Breast and thyroid cancer account for almost half of all cancer cases in women under the age of 50, noted Rebecca Siegel, lead author of the report and senior scientific director of surveillance research at the American Cancer Society.

The report also noted racial inequalities. For example, Black people are twice as likely to die from prostate, stomach and uterine cancers compared to white people and 50% more likely to die from preventable cervical cancer. And cancer rates in Native American people are double or triple the rates of white people for kidney, liver, stomach and cervical cancers.

Dahut said the report noted that progress in the treatment of pancreatic cancer, the third leading cause of cancer mortality, is lagging. This is probably due to the fact pancreatic cancer, that claimed the lives of Steve Jobs and Alex Trebek, is hard to detect in its early stages and needs more screening and treatment options.