Objective: To describe the mortality of esophageal cancer (EC) in China during 2004 - 2005, and its trends over past 30 years.
Methods: The Third National Retrospective Sampling Survey of Death Causes in 2004 - 2005 was covered 142 660 482 person years (72 970 241 person years in male, 69 690 241 person years in female; 47 899 806 person years in urban, 94 760 676 person years in rural). All death records of EC cases were selected. Crude, age-adjusted mortality, the proportion to all cancer deaths, and age-standardized death rate by Chinese standard population (CASR) and world standard population (WASR) were calculated. The statistic indexes of mortality were compared with those of previous retrospective death surveys in 1973 - 1975 and 1990 - 1992.
Results: During 2004 - 2005, the crude death rate of EC was 15.21/100 000 (21 694/142 660 482), CASR was 9.98/100 000, EC death accounted for 11.19% (21 694/193 841) and ranked fourth of all cancer death causes. The CASR of male (14.32/100 000, 15 067 cases) was higher than that of female (5.75/100 000, 6627 cases). In rural areas, there were 16 437 deaths caused by EC with CASR of 12.01/100 000, it was higher than in urban areas (CASR was 6.48/100 000, 5257 deaths). There were little different of EC mortality among Eastern, Central and Western areas in China. EC crude death rate in Eastern was the highest with rate of 16.67/100 000 (8761/52 556 694) and the lowest rate was 12.92/100 000 (5209/40 322 563) in Western area. EC crude death rate was increased by age increasing and reached the peak with mortality of 180.55/100 000 (1984/1 098 885) at age group of 80-. The CASR of EC was reduced by 41.64% compared with the first survey (CASR was 17.10/100 000) in 1973 - 1975, and reduced by 33.56% compared with the second survey (CASR was 15.02/100 000) in 1990 - 1992.
Conclusion: Although the EC mortality has dropped obviously in the past three decades, it is still the main cancer burden, especially in rural areas. EC prevention and control should be focused on the rural high risk areas in China in future.