Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Cancer Policy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jcpo Projections of burden of cancers: A new approach for measuring incidence cases for India and its states – Till 2025 Jang Bahadur Prasad a, ⁎ , Murali Dhar b a Department of Population Policies and Programmes, International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India b Department of Population Policies and Programmes, International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India ARTICLE INFO Keywords: PBCRs Burden of cancers Regional projections India and its states ABSTRACT Background: Changing the way of life, rising longevity and progressive control of communicable diseases have led to emergence non-communicable diseases, which emerged as a significant public health problem in India and other developing countries during the second half of last century. The burden of cancer is one of the vital contributors to non-communicable diseases in India. It accounts for around 706 thousands of cancers cases in males and 666 thousand in females in 2015. Objectives: This study aimed to assess the burden of cancers by place of residence for India and its states for 2015–25. Materials and methods: In India, National Cancer Registry Programme (NCRP) is only a reliable source for data on cancer. Henceforth, the cancer incidence rates were taken into account from Population-Based Cancer Registries (PBCRs) generated by National Cancer Registries Programmes (NCRP) under Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and a population of India and its states were taken from the report projected by Registrar General of India formed the sources of data. Best possible assessment for incidence rates for non- available registry states was worked out by using limited available data. The linear regression method was used to assess trend and project the rates for 2015–25. Results: The overall burden of cancers in India was estimated to be 1.37 million in 2015, and it was increased to nearly 1.80 million by 2025, an increase of more than 31.4%. A major portion of this burden was in rural men (three fifths) and males (more than half). The detailed analysis indicated regional diversity in the burden of different types of cancers. Conclusion: In view of increasing burden of cancers, there is burning need to initiate focused on control measures to combat the same. 1. Introduction Globally, nearly 12.7 million new cancer cases and 7.6 million cancer deaths occurred in 2008. However, in India, new cancer in- cidence was estimated to be 0.95 million, and cancer deaths were 0.63 million [1]. Cancer incidence will keep on growing in the country in the future as an effect of increase in life expectancy, size of population and proportion of the elderly population, due to non appearance of any mass screening programmes in the country. Increasing longevity, al- terations in lifestyles, urbanization, globalization and progressive con- trol of communicable diseases have led to the appearance of cancer and other non-communicable diseases as a significant health problem. Projections of cancer incidence present an estimate of the future burden of cancer and are fundamental to the progression of planning for programmes of cancer control as well as creating the situation priorities for future research. Additionally, by providing a target for the expected rates of disease given current exposure to aetiological factors and healthcare interventions, projections become an essential tool in evaluating the effectiveness of new programmes that aim to diminish incidence, mortality or both [2]. The magnitude of the cancer incidence projections by different site, age and sex based on different methods exists till the year 2016 [3], 2020 [4] and 2026 [5]. However, there is no visible study estimating the incidence for all the states and union territories in India. Moreover, studies in the past have used single (pooled/average) incidence rates for India assuming same risk of occurrence of cancer throughout the country. This assumption is hardly tenable in view of vast heterogeneity in the country. Therefore, there is need for a better approach to esti- mate the cancer incidence for India and its states. This study has used a new approach to estimate the cancer incidence for all states, union https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcpo.2018.04.007 Received 25 January 2018; Accepted 9 April 2018 ⁎ Corresponding author at: International Institute for Population Sciences, Govandi Station Road, Deonar, Mumbai, 400008, India. E-mail addresses: jbiips12@gmail.com, jang.bhu10@gmail.com (J.B. Prasad), m.dhar@iips.net (M. Dhar). Journal of Cancer Policy 16 (2018) 57–62 Available online 27 April 2018 2213-5383/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T