Cancer projections to 2020

Between 1994 and 2011, an average of 6,899 cases of invasive skin cancer was diagnosed per year in Ireland. Malignant melanoma accounted for just over 8% of this number; the vast bulk of all invasive skin cancers being non-melanomatous subtypes, of which over 6,300 were diagnosed each year (Table 1). Over 95% of these “nonmelanoma” skin cancers were histologically diagnosed and almost all were either basal (68% approximately) or squamous (30%) cell carcinomas (BCC and SCC respectively). The remaining nonmelanoma subtypes were all very rare by comparison and included Kaposi sarcoma and cutaneous lymphomas, principally mycosis fungoides and T-cell lymphomas. The remainder of this report deals with BCC and SCC only.