An international study, the Concord Report, comparing cancer survival rates in 31 nations for four types of cancer, shows that the U.S. topped survival rates for breast and prostate cancer, while for colorectal cancer, Japan led the men's category and France the women's category.

Canada ranked high in the four categories, indicating the good access rate of Canadian cancer patients to quality health care.

For breast cancer in women, Canada ranked second, third in prostate cancer and colorectal cancer in women and sixth in men.

According to Dr. Michel Coleman, professor of epidemiology and vital statistics at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, for these four types of malignancies, survival rate among Canadian is high and uniform across all provinces.

"It suggests fairly uniform access to a high standard of health care," wrote Coleman, who authored the study which has been published online and will come out in the August edition of The Lancet Oncology.