On Feb. 24, 2025, breast cancer is the most common cancer in women worldwide, but survival chances vary drastically depending on where a woman lives, a new study shows.

Using global data, the work paints a detailed picture of breast cancer trends and disparities across countries. Although wealthy nations have more diagnoses, low- and middle-income countries face higher death rates owing to limited access to early detection and treatment.

An international team of scientists led by the Alberta Health Services in Calgary, Canada looked at the global impact of breast cancer in 2022, the most recent year for which estimates of cases and deaths were available, and projected the impact in 2050 across 185 countries.

In 2022, there were 2.3 million new cases and 670,000 deaths from breast cancer globally. However, death rates were higher in poorer regions than in wealthier nations (see ‘Global burden’). For example, those aged under 50 in low-income countries were four times more likely to die from breast cancer than were those in high-income countries.

If current trends continue, there will be 3.2 million new breast cancer cases and 1.1 million breast cancer-related deaths in 2050, the analysis estimates, with low-income countries facing a 145% increase in both measures. The study findings were published in Nature Medicine.