From Tony Waldron
Further to your look at how common “modern” diseases were in the past (9 November, p 36). I showed some years ago that the age-specific prevalence rates of cancers that involve bone were of the same order of magnitude in the past as they are today.
This finding is in line with the hypothesis that the burden of human cancer has not changed over time, only the manner in which it appears, something determined by, among other things, diet, habits like smoking, and environmental factors.
London, UK
