In South Korea, most of the rise in thyroid cancer diagnoses between 1999 and 2008 was from tiny tumors that almost never kill people — doctors were just finding them more often, not because more people were getting deadly cancer.

In South Korea, between 1999 and 2008, doctors started finding a lot more tiny thyroid cancers—so many that the overall number jumped more than six times. But almost all of these were very small tumors that probably wouldn’t have caused any harm if left alone.

In South Korea, more people were diagnosed with tiny thyroid lumps between 1999 and 2008—not because more people got sick, but because doctors started scanning for them more often with fancy tests.

In South Korea, doctors started finding a lot more cases of thyroid cancer between 1993 and 2011—15 times more—but surprisingly, the number of people dying from it didn’t go up at all.

In South Korea, doctors found way more cases of thyroid cancer between 1999 and 2008, but surprisingly, not more people died from it. This suggests they’re just finding harmless lumps that wouldn’t have hurt anyone, not more deadly cancers.

In South Korea, more people were diagnosed with thyroid cancer between 1999 and 2012, but the number of people dying from it didn’t go up — which suggests doctors are just finding harmless lumps that wouldn’t have hurt anyone, not more dangerous cancers.