Lung cancer prevalence

Scitovsky et al. (1986) calculated the average cost per AIDS-related hospital admission as US 9,024 ranging from US 7,026 to US 23,425. A more comprehensive picture is presented by Scitovsky and Rice (1987), who estimated provider cost of the AIDS epidemic in the United States in 1985, 1986, and 1991, based on prevalence estimates provided by the Center for Disease Control (CDC). They predicted that the core provider costs of AIDS would rise from US 630 million in 1985 to US 1.1 billion in 1986 and to US 8.5 billion in 1991. The authors compared their estimates of the cost of AIDS in the USA with the estimates for end-stage renal disease (US 2.2 billion), traffic accidents (US 5.6 billion), lung cancer (US 2.7 billion), and breast cancer (US 2.2 billion). They concluded that the core provider costs of AIDS were relatively low in comparison with the provider costs of all illness as well as the costs of these other diseases. However, they also assessed the non-care costs (e.g., for research) to rise from US 319 million in 1985 to US 542 million in 1986 and to US 2.3 billion in 1991. 

Khachatryan (1972a,b) reported on patients with skin and lung cancer who attended an oncology department in an industrial area of Armenia with a high prevalence of workers employed in the chemical industry. These included 18 cases of lung cancer and 21 of skin cancer among workers with high exposure to chloroprene. 

In 1879, human chemical exposures were studied during the Industrial Revolution period. It was found that chronic dermal contact with shale oil, coal distillates, petroleum products, or chimney soot could cause skin cancer. An inordinate prevalence of lung cancer was exhibited among coal miners and was the first internal cancer associated with a known occupational exposure. An iatrogenic cancer of the skin, due to long-term ingestion of potassium arsenite from Fowler s solution (used as a tonic in small doses), was recorded by 1887. In 1895, excessive cancer of the urinary bladder was identified in workers from the aniline dye industry. 

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