The Journal of the National Cancer Institute published a study that stated -- a sharp decline in the use of premenopausal hormones was followed by a drop in the rate of breast cancer.

In the recent past, large clinical trials were conducted as part of the Women's Health Initiative that raised concerns about the health risks from hormonal therapies to manage menopausal symptoms. This report led many to stop using the drugs.

Since those reports that were published in 2002, the sharp decline in hormonal drugs has also seen a decline in breast cancer cases. They are not sure if this is the only reason that breast cancer rates have dropped.

The researchers however think the results of the trial provide additional evidence that recent declines in breast cancer incidence may be due in part to a decline in the use of postmenopausal hormones.

It didn't register right away. But not long after I finished doing some research yesterday on breast cancer screening tools did I realize the statistics on breast cancer incidence have changed for 2007. Not only did they change -- they're moving in exactly the right direction.

Think about this:

The American Cancer Society reports that 178,480 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in American women in 2007. This number was 212,920 in 2006. Deaths by breast cancer -- there were 40,970 in 2006 -- will number 40,910 this year.

Just as it had become second nature for me to rattle off 200,000 as the general number of women diagnosed with breast cancer each year, I must learn a new number. I love it.

Cancer cases are expected to more than double between the years 2000 and 2030, says the director of the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer.

This upward climb will occur primarily in poor countries due to an increase in population growth, longer life expectancy, more smoking, and a lack of health care in low and medium-resource countries.

"What's going to happen between now and 2030 is that the population is going to increase from about 6.5 billion to 8 billion in 2030," Dr. Peter Boyle reports. "So even if the risks remain constant at each five-year age group, because we've got more people around, we're going to have more cases of cancer.

It's the unfortunate successes for developed countries over the past 40 years, such as the export of cigarette smoking and alcohol consumption, that have doomed poorer countries, says Boyle.

Consider this definition of doom: By the year 2030, there will be 27 million cases of cancer, 17 million deaths caused by the disease, and 75 million people living with cancer.

Women with ovulation disorders -- and related infertility problems -- have a lower risk of developing breast cancer, according to a study of more than 116,000 women.

Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston studied data from the Nurses' Health Study II and evaluated female nurses aged 25 to 42, tracking them every two years beginning in 1989 and ending in 2001.

Results of the study, reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine, revealed 1,357 diagnosed cases of invasive breast cancer. Overall, women with ovulation disorders had a 25 percent less chance of developing this disease than those without the disorder.

Also detected was an even lower risk of breast cancer for women who experienced induced ovulation for treatment of infertility. This is potentially great news -- pending more research, of course -- for women worried about breast cancer implications of infertility treatment.

All cancers are not treated equally. Some attract a frenzy of attention -- breast cancer -- and some receive not much attention at all -- gallbladder cancer. Some are vigorously researched and studied. Others sit by idly, rarely the subject of investigation. Some are feverishly funded. Some never prosper by way of financial support. Yet they all share something very important in common. They are all cancer.

All cancers are marked by an uncontrollable division and spread of abnormal cells. And they are all capable of delivering shock and despair and even death to any one of us. And that makes each one -- brain cancer, cervical cancer, colon cancer, eye cancer, liver cancer, prostate cancer, stomach cancer, you name it -- worthy of equal attention.

And so I bring to you Cancer by the Numbers, a series of posts that will feature the basics about all sorts of cancer, beginning with the numbers -- the statistics -- to help define the prevalence of each cancer, followed by important facts about screening, diagnosis, treatment, survival, and more. I will cover the well-known cancers, the sort-of-known cancers, the barely-known cancers. And while I can only offer what I can track down on each form of cancer, I intend to dish out every piece of data I can dig up -- so we all can become a little more informed, a little more prepared should we have to personally do battle with any one of the 100 possible cancers out there.

The American Cancer Society reports that 1,399,790 new cancer cases will be diagnosed in 2006. This estimate does not include most carcinoma in situ (noninvasive cancer) cases and also does take into account the estimated one million cases of basal and squamous cell skin cancers that will be diagnosed this year. Of these predicted cases, about 564,830 will result in death -- that's more than 1,500 people each day. Cancer is the second most common cause of death in the United States, exceeded only by heart disease, and accounts for one of every four deaths.

These numbers are staggering. But without further explanation, they are broad and all-encompassing and don't say much about how all the individual diseases add up. That's what I plan to do -- break it all down, cancer by cancer, until the numbers make sense. And the cancers do too.

An announcement last Wednesday revealed an overall decline in cancer death rates -- probably due to reduced exposure to tobacco, early detection, and better treatment. But the announcement also revealed a surprising jump in cases of thyroid cancer for women.

Between the years 1981 and 1993, incidence rates among women climbed 2.2 percent each year. Between the years 1993 and 2000, they rose 4.6 percent per year. And between 2000 and 2003, there was a 9.1 percent increase each year. This could be a result of better diagnosis but scientists are wondering if there is an unknown risk factor contributing to this startling finding. And it will take at least two more years to determine whether this is a random fluctuation or a true trend. The rate of thyroid cancer in men has also increased but not as much as for women.

The silver lining in this cancer cloud is that trends -- such as those showing increases in cancer incidences and death rates -- often fuel the fight against cancer because researchers are alerted to look for causes which ultimately results in better detection and better prevention.

Most current media reports have us believing that incidences of cancer are at epidemic proportions. What isn't making headlines is the fact that for many cancers, incidences of the disease are on the decline. This is what the American Council on Science and Health states as a result of a new report released from the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries, the American Cancer Society, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If only reports like this were splashed all over our newspapers and television screens -- instead of grim reports of increasing diagnoses and deaths -- then maybe the outlook on cancer would be a bit more hopeful.

Rates of colorectal cancer, uterine cancer, stomach cancer, and cervical cancer have all been declining for two years. Drops in cases are mostly attributed to lower rates of smoking, better screening, and better treatments. For men, lung cancer death rates have also fallen.

So not all incidences of all cancers have dropped -- but some have. And this should at least keep us hoping, dreaming, wishing for a day when cancer is not even loosely associated with the word epidemic. And it should surely be cause for at least some media coverage.

A chemical found in hard plastics -- such as CD cases, baby bottles, food-storage containers, and even electronics parts -- has been loosely linked to incidences of breast cancer. Popular opinion cautions that if we were not worried about this news yesterday, we should not be worried about it today -- because studies are preliminary and nothing is definitive at this point. But there are definitely two sides to the debate over how harmful these hard plastics may be.

The chemical in question -- a pseudo-estrogen called bisphenol-A (BPA) -- appears to be absorbed by breast tumor cells, according to a new study published in the August 28 issue of Chemistry & Biology. Previous studies have linked small exposures of BPA to prostate abnormalities in mice that suggest a link between the plastic chemical and human prostate cancer. Some studies even theorize that embryonic and fetal exposure might influence mental retardation and birth defects. And because this pseudo-estrogen is a synthetic material that in human cells can trigger estrogenic effects, breast cancer now comes up as a disease that may result from this questionable chemical.

Critics say that average levels of the chemical found in urine is infinitesimally small -- about one part per billion. Some say the results of this research come from in-vitro studies that one expert says can never fully explain human disease. Yet the real crux of the matter, according to another expert, is that we are surrounded by all sorts of chemicals that are pseudo-estrogenic -- not just BPA -- and it's the cumulative effects that we do need to worry about.

The bikini turns 60 this month and makes news not just for its birthday but also for its new feature -- a built-in alarm to warn wearers to get out of the sun. Not all bikinis will talk -- but those made by Canadian company Solestrom will. Solestrom has created a new bikini that goes on sale next month with a UV meter built into its belt and an alarm that sounds when it's time to seek shade. The meter on the $190 bikini displays a level of UV intensity on a scale from 0 to 20. Three to five is moderate strength, eight to 10 is very high, and anything above 11 is extreme. A person's sensitivity to UV depends mainly on skin type so this scale operates in general terms.

Despite increasing awareness of the sun's dangers, sales remain strong for the bikini. So Solestrom developed this suit to ease some of the worries about the sun's damaging rays. They have already been met with high demand from Australia and South Africa -- where skin cancer rates are highest. The United States -- now in the loop too -- has about 1 million new skin cancer cases each year.

Lung cancer affects more than 80,000 American women annually. More than 70,000 of these cases are fatal. Thirty thousand more women die from lung cancer than from breast cancer. And lung cancer claims more lives of more women than breast, uterine, and ovarian cancers combined. Yet a new study reveals that American women are uninformed about statistics like these -- and about the threats posed by lung cancer.

A 2006 survey of 500 women provides a snapshot of women's attitudes and beliefs about lung cancer -- and the overwhelming conclusion is that there is a widespread lack of awareness about the nation's top cancer killer. And here's the lowdown:

• Only 41 percent of women know that lung cancer is the leading cancer killer in the United States.
• Only 8 percent of women know that exposure to radon gas is the second leading cause of lung cancer -- 60 percent instead believe that second-hand smoke is the culprit.
• Only 36 percent of women know lung cancer kills more women than breast cancer.
• Only 41 percent of women know that one in 17 women will develop lung cancer sometime in her life.
• Only 4 percent of women know that women typically fare better than men following lung cancer treatment.
• And 25 percent of women mistakingly believe that there is a standard screening test to detect lung cancer in its early stages. Currently, there is not one.

Lung cancer is often believed to be a man's disease. But it is not. It affects tens of thousands of women too. And now I -- as one of the previously uninformed women -- know better.

When Denise Ashford was 14 weeks pregnant, a fetal ultrasound scan revealed signs of a tumor in her unborn child. Her child had cancer. The young mother, only 19 years old at the time, was counseled on having an abortion. The cancer her baby had was neuroblastoma, a cancer that forms in nerve tissue of the adrenal gland, neck, chest, or spinal cord. Ashford, and the father Peter Thomas, refused to consider aborting the baby -- they said they would hang on for a miracle.

Each week, tests were done to watch how the unborn baby's tumor was growing. Within weeks, the tumor had begun to shrink.

"The doctors told us that sometimes in very small children this type of tumor can shrink over time. But then over the next four weeks, we were given some even more unbelievable news -- the tumor had disappeared altogether," stated Ashford.

Kiah Thomas came into this world at 6 pounds 1 ounce, and celebrates her fifth birthday as a happy healthy child. At the time of her birth, doctors said it was very rare for cancer to be detected in a baby before birth and then for it to disappear. But it happens. Called spontaneous remission, regression or miracles, stories of cancer patients defying the greatest of odds or having cancer suddenly disappear have always been told, as anecdotal evidence of mysteries we do not fully understand or have yet to seriously study.

For more information about spontaneous remission, the Institute of Noetic Sciences has compiled the largest database of medically reported cases of spontaneous remission in the world by reviewing over 3,500 references, from more than 800 journals in 20 languages, as a step towards expanding our knowledge and understanding of a real phenomenon that occurs, and yet, no one can explain.

I have a Vera Bradley purse -- a backpack, actually -- that is black with pink ribbons and little multi-colored flowers sprinkled all over the fabric. The print is called New Hope and a portion of the proceeds from the purchase of this bag go toward breast cancer research. Now there is a second print available that also carries hope for a cure. Hope Toile is the name of this bright, cheery, perfect-for-summer, pink bag -- and like the purse I have, part of the sales will benefit the Vera Bradley Foundation for Breast Cancer. Since 1994, Vera Bradley has raised more than four million dollars for breast cancer research and this pattern -- which also shows up on accessories such as umbrellas, wallets, belts, eyeglass cases, and watches -- symbolizes renewed hope for a cure. And while I don't have this purse yet, it is on my wish list for a time when I need something new and fresh and hopeful.