The real stats for cancer risk

Women who have never smoked are no more likely to die from lung cancer than male nonsmokers -- despite conventional wisdom.

In fact, men who never smoked had higher lung cancer death rates than female lifelong nonsmokers, the study of nearly a million Americans found.

“Our findings, paradoxically, are compatible with the clinical perception that women outnumber men among lung cancer patients who never smoked,” said Dr. Michael Thun of the American Cancer Society, who led the study.

“But the reason appears to be unrelated to cancer risk,” Thun added in a statement.

“Instead, it appears to be the result of the fact that there are far more women than men older than 60 who never smoked. Census data show there are about 16.2 million women compared with just 6.4 million men in the U.S. who are over 60 and never smoked.”

The lung cancer death in March of Dana Reeve, a nonsmoker and widow of “Superman” star Christopher Reeve, focused attention on the small but significant risk nonsmokers have from lung cancer.