This decline is seen in blacks, it's seen in whites, it's seen in Hispanics, it's seen in all Americans," Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society.

However, cancer remains the No. 2 killer of Americans, with more than half a million deaths annually, topped only by heart disease.

While overall cancer death rates decreased by 1.5 percent per year from 1993 to 2001 among men, they declined by 2 percent per year from 2001 to 2005. Among women, cancer death rates fell by 0.8 percent per year from 1994 to 2002 and by a much steeper 1.6 percent per year from 2002 to 2005.

The report, published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, detailed progress in cutting new cases of the three most common kinds of cancers among men -- lung, colorectal and prostate -- and the two most common types among women -- breast and colorectal. It also showed a leveling off of women's lung cancer death rates.