An Article by Audrey Bonaventure and colleagues in the Lancet Haematology provides international comparisons of 5-year net survival statistics of children diagnosed with leukaemia, and another Article by Eva Steliarova-Foucher and colleagues in the Lancet Oncology is an exhaustive report on worldwide incidence rates of childhood cancers observed in 2001–10. Both are based on best-quality data from population-based cancer registries. The first Article by Bonaventure and colleagues1 documents the steady improvements in survival in children with leukaemia from 1995–2009.

There is much uncertainty about the risks of leukaemia and lymphoma after repeated or protracted low-dose radiation exposure typical of occupational, environmental, and diagnostic medical settings. We quantified associations between protracted low-dose radiation exposures and leukaemia, lymphoma, and multiple myeloma mortality among radiation-monitored adults employed in France, the UK, and the USA.