More Women Under 40 in Europe with Breast Cancer

A recent study shows that the number of women who have breast cancer is rising among individuals under 40.

At this time, experts are unclear whether this is due to improved diagnosis or new factors.

Researchers found that cases rose by close to one percent a year between 1990 and 2008 in seven countries.

Breast cancer is the most common cause of cancer among women globally, as well as the leading cause of cancer death, according to the BBC, though cancer in young women is relatively rare at about five percent.

Researchers from France and Italy looked at trends regarding breast cancer in women under 40 in Belgium, Bulgaria, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland over an 18-year period.

The study showed that breast cancer cases rose by around one percent a year in women under 40 with the greatest rise in women under 35.

However, it's unclear if this is due to a rise in risk factors or improved methods used for diagnosing the problem.

Lead study author Dr. Brice Leclere of the GRELL working group discussed the findings. "The rise in incidence was greater for women under 35 and for ductal carcinomas [a type of tumour in the ducts of the mammary gland]," he said, via a press release. "This increase can be due to a rise in risk factors and/or changes in diagnosis and surveillance practices, but we could not clearly distinguish between these two non-exclusive explanations."

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More information regarding the study can be found via the journal Cancer Epidemiology.