In the 1960s only about 3 out of every 10 children (30%) with cancer were successfully treated. But in the past 40 years treatment for children with cancer has improved greatly. Now more than 8 out of every 10 children diagnosed with cancer will live for at least 5 years. Most of these children will be cured. Hodgkin lymphoma and an eye cancer called retinoblastoma are curable in more than 9 out of 10 children (90%). Even though cancer is not common in children, it is the most common cause of death from illness in children between the ages of 1 and 15. This is because children today are at much lower risk of dying from infectious diseases than they were in the past. So although the percentages of children dying from various cancers have gone down, the proportion of childhood deaths from cancer overall has gone up.