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Global Incidence

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Globally, approximately 1 in 15,000 children is affected by retinoblastoma, and an estimated 8,500 children are newly affected around the world each year. Approximately 92% of these children live in developing countries, and there is some suggestion of a higher incidence along the Equatorial belt. However

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it is most likely that the numbers of affected children seem higher in equatorial countries simply because of their large, young populations and high birth rates.  For example, Canada and Kenya have roughly the same total population  The proportion of Canada’s population aged under 15 is only 18% however, compared with 44% in Kenya.  Canada has a very low birth rate, but Kenya's birth rate is very high, so significantly more children in Kenya will be aged under 5 years.  This is why Canada experiences only 23 new cases of retinoblastoma per year, compared to 86 in Kenya. As post-natal care improves in developing countries, the number of children surviving infancy is increasing.  This is likely to mean a rise in the number of children affected by retinoblastoma in developing countries.

In some developing countres, retinoblastoma accounts for more than 10% of diagnosed cancers in children under 15years, compared to just 3% in the UK. In these countries, many children with more common childhood cancers, such as leukaemias and brain tumours, are believed to die before diagnosis or arrival at the specialist centre.  This causes retinoblastoma to appear more common than in the developed world.

Only a small proportion of children with retinoblastoma in developing countries are ever seen at modern health care centres that keep records of cancer diagnoses.  Where registers do exist, many cases of retinoblastoma are excluded for reasons such as lack of pathological diagnosis or treatment in ophthalmology or neurology - rather than oncology - departments.  As a result, global statistical data about retinoblastoma is inconsistent and incomplete, resulting in a lack of comprehensive knowledge about diagnosis, treatment and survival of this disease around the world.  The following country by country estimates are calculated from population, birth rate and infant mortality data, and an average discovery rate of 1 in15,000 live births.  When compared with data from well established tumour registries, these figures are found to be accurate.  These data suggest a global incidence of 8,300 new cases per year.

Global Incidence of Retinoblastoma: listing by incidence

Global Incidence of Retinoblastoma: alphabetical listing

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