What's your risk of cancer? Figures show 40 PERCENT of Americans will develop disease in their lifetimes - aft

The shock announcement that the Princess of Wales is battling cancer comes amid rising cancer rates across the US — particularly among younger adults.

Data suggests nearly 40 per cent of Americans will develop the disease in their lifetime — while one in five diagnosed will die from the illness.

Men were most at risk overall, with 41.9 per cent said to be diagnosed with cancer before they die — with lung, colon, breast and prostate cancer the most common.

Kate Middleton, 42, revealed her diagnosis on Friday, saying she was receiving preventative chemotherapy.

Kate Middleton posted a video online where she revealed her cancer diagnosis and that she was receiving preventative chemotherapy

The estimates of lifetime cancer risk — or the risk of suffering from cancer before death — were calculated by the American Cancer Society, which analyzed data on millions of cases reported to the US national registry.

To estimate the risk of suffering from cancer in someone's lifetime, the team analyzed national rates of each type of the disease between 2017 to 2019.

The ACS noted online that the estimates would vary from person to person depending on their risk factors.

This could include whether they are obese, have a family history of cancer or how often an individual exercises.

Overall, the results suggested that for men, they are most likely to develop prostate cancer — at 12.9 per cent.

Lung cancer was the second most common, with 6.3 per cent estimated to suffer from the disease, and colon cancer was third, with 4.3 per cent.

For women, the cancer they were most at risk from was breast cancer — with 13 per cent of women estimated to be diagnosed with the disease before death.

Similar to men, lung cancer was also the second most common (5.9 per cent) and colon cancer the third most common (3.9 per cent).

In both groups, Hodgkin's lymphoma — cancer of the lymph system — was the least common with 0.2 per cent of both genders suffering from this.

The analysis — based on data from the National Cancer Institute — did not breakdown the risk of cancer diagnosis by age.

But separate data shows those aged between 65 and 74 years are most at risk — with nearly 30 per cent of cancers diagnosed in this age group. 

They are followed by 55 to 64-year-olds, who account for 24.1 per cent of cases.

At the other end of the scale, people under 20 years old and those aged 20 to 34 years were least at risk accounting for up to 2.7 per cent of cases.

But this trend is rapidly changing as young people face a mystery epidemic of stomach and colon cancers.