Can anyone give me a percent of peoples ages that get acute lymphoblastic leukemia?

Leukemias account for 2% of all cancers. Because leukemia is the most common form of childhood cancer, it is often regarded as a disease of childhood. However, leukemias affect nine times as many adults as children. Half of the cases occur in people who are 60 years of age or older. The incidence of acute and chronic leukemias is about the same.

peak incidence is 2-5 years

Incidence by Race and Ethnicity
Incidence rates for all types of cancer are 7 percent higher among Americans of African descent than among those of European descent. The incidence rate for all cancers among African Americans, from 1973-2002, was 505.2 per 100,000 population, averaging about 175,093 cases each year.

Leukemia is one of the top 15 most frequently occuring cancers in minority groups. Leukemia incidence is highest among whites and lowest among American Indians/Alaskan natives.

Leukemia rates are substantially higher for white children than for black children.

Hispanic children of all races under the age of 20 have the highest rates of leukemia.


Incidence by Age Group
Incidence rates by age differ for each of the leukemias. The leukemias represented 25 percent of all cancers occurring among children younger than 20 years from 1997-2002. In the 13 SEER areas of the United States, there were 1,490 children under the age of 20 diagnosed with leukemia from 1998-2002, including 1,113 with ALL. From this data, it is estimated that 3,521 children will be diagnosed with leukemia in 2005 throughout the United States. Nearly 2,455 new cases of childhood ALL are expected to occur in 2005.

The most common form of leukemia among children under 19 years of age is ALL. The incidence of ALL among 1- to 4-year-old children is more than 10 times greater than the rate for young adults ages 20-24.
There is optimism within centers that specialize in the treatment of children because survival statistics have dramatically improved over the past 30 years. Most children with ALL are cured.

CLL and AML incidence increase dramatically among people who are over the age of 50, and CML incidence increases dramatically among people who are over the age of 60. These cancers are most prevalent in the seventh, eighth and ninth decades of life.