In your last comment, you accused me of “making upâ€? up the 80% stat. Now you’re telling me that it’s merely “out of date.â€? You need to be more consistent with your calumnies. As to the tired “you guys do more screening” argument, it isn’t worth refuting (again).

Regarding your new stats, can we trust numbers from any agency serving a government notorious for fiddling data? A regime that will condone stacking patients in A&E parking lots to improve wait time stats would hardly stick at fudging these data.

1. You are confusing survival with mortality. I (and the person on AmSpec) made the point that mortality rates from prostate cancer are not widely different between the US and the UK. Indeed, as you’ll see that for all cancers from this table (http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_dea_fro_can-health-death-from-cancer) the UK actually as the lowest death rate for cancer per 100,000 of the 16 nations listed, including the US.

2 And the key point is that what you are posting are (unsourced) out of date 5 year survival data. That is, the percent alive over 5 years after diagnosis. As you do know I’m sure, the US has a much higher rate of prostate screening that picks up many more cancers, many of which will never be life threatening. So the US 5 year survival rate is artificially high and in fact the latest US prostate screening study shows no benefit to screening. And the latest figure from England shows a 80% 5 year survival for prostate (see http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=861), and where prostate cancer is picked up early we have a better than US rate of 98.5% 5 year survival – showing the NHS works very well but that it’s tough to get English men to see doctors.

So – I’m sure you don’t think that the figures you posted mean that American men are almost twice as likely not to die from prostate cancer, but I’m not sure what you do think they mean.

US prostate survival rate = 91.9%

UK prostate survival rate = 51.1%

Difference = 40.8%

40.8% / 51.1% = 80%

To put it in terms a “progressive� can understand: If you have 5 apples and add 4 more, you have increased your apples by 80%. Likewise, if your cancer survival rate is 51.1% and you increase it to 91.9%, you have gained 80%.

As to the commenter at AmSpec, his assertion that American and British men have “similar� prostate survival rates is preposterous. It isn’t supported by any credible study (which is why he hasn’t quoted his source).

Here’s a nice chart showing how your country stacks up: