Canadian Cancer Society launches national plan to cut lung cancer deaths by 30%

The Canadian Cancer Society says it wants doctors, educators and policy makers to abide by a strategy to cut cancer rates by 30 per cent.

The Canadian Cancer Society has unveiled a decade-long national plan aimed at cutting lung cancer deaths by 30 per cent, calling it an unprecedented effort to change the trajectory of the country’s deadliest cancer.

The 2026–2035 Pan-Canadian Lung Cancer Action Plan was unveiled at a national conference in Calgary on November 2.

“Canada is experiencing a lung cancer crisis, and despite advances in treatment and detection, we’re still seeing lung cancer as the highest cause of cancer death,” said Annemarie Edwards, vice-president of cancer strategy and innovation at the Canadian Cancer Society and co-chair of the Lung Cancer Action Plan steering committee.

“Focused collective action is required.”

Action plan

The Action Plan outlines a coordinated roadmap built around four priorities:

• Reducing exposure to carcinogenic inhalants by strengthening tobacco control, raising awareness of risk factors such as radon and wildfire smoke, and improving air-quality standards.
• Detecting lung cancer earlier by expanding eligibility for low-dose CT scans, improving diagnostic access and awareness, and catching cancers at a stage when treatment is most effective.
• Ensuring access to best-in-class care, so Canadians receive equitable treatment and navigation services regardless of where they live.
• Accelerating research to move innovations from the lab to patients faster.

“Lung cancer mortality rates is about the same as the number of people who die every year from breast, colorectal and prostate cancers,” Edwards said.

“Too many lives are being cut short,” Edwards added, “and Canada needs to work together to achieve the goal of the Lung Cancer Action Plan, which is to reduce lung cancer deaths by 30 per cent over the next 10 years, which will save thousands of lives.”

The plan also confronts long-standing stigma and misconceptions that lung cancer is solely a smoker’s disease.

“We need to get the message out that lung cancer is not only due to smoking tobacco. Anyone with lungs can get lung cancer,” Edwards said. “Stigma is a major factor in and we need to change attitudes that even if you are a smoker, you are eligible for access to care. We have to eliminate the stigma.”

Awareness

Dr. Christian Finley, a thoracic surgeon and co-chair of the steering committee, said awareness and access are key. “the number of people that die from lung cancer is more than that die from colon, breast and prostate combined,” he said. “we have the toolkit available already. We just need to execute it… lung cancer screening is more effective than any other cancer screening that we have.”

Finley said lung cancer is also linked to “radon exposure, wildfire smoke and other environmental exposures, occupational exposures.”

He noted that “30 per cent of lung cancer happens to people who don’t smoke,” underscoring that the disease affects a wide cross-section of Canadians.

Early detection

For Jan Pezarro, who has faced lung cancer three times, the plan highlights the urgency of early detection and national consistency. “I know in Canada, we have a constrained resources for different treatments,” she said. “Is it possible that lung cancer screening didn’t come as high up the list because of that stigma? Unfortunately, it may be true on some level.”

She said expanding access to screening programs is essential. “the reality that for a publicly funded health care system, the cost benefit… is so much greater if we can find lung cancer early,” she said. “Notwithstanding, the human cost of losing a loved one to lung cancer.”

Edwards said national leadership and accountability will determine whether the plan succeeds. “We are very optimistic that this will be like nothing ever before in Canada,” she said. “Never before has the lung cancer ecosystem come together like this with one specific goal that is measurable and we will be accountable to measuring the achievement of our work.”

The Canadian Cancer Society is calling on governments, researchers and communities to join the effort, saying collective action is needed to save lives over the next decade.

Learn more at cancer.ca/lungcanceractionplan