Saloni Dattani writes, “The age-standardized death rate from cancer has declined by around a third since 1990 in the US. This means that, on average, people of a given age in 2021 had a third lower risk of cancer death than people of the same age in 1990. In many other high-income countries, the trend is similar, with a general decline since the late 80s or early 90s.”

That’s partly the result of the decline in smoking — but there are other contributors, too.