Norway
Eystein Glattre
The kingdom of Norway is a constitutional democracy with a parliamentary system of government. Norway is a geographical area consisting of 1,064,000 km2 of ocean to the north, west and south of the mainland. The mainland, which amounts to 324,000 km2, is situated on the western part of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The rugged coastline of terrestrial Norway is more than 50,000 km long. In addition come the islands of Spitzbergen (61,500 km2), Jan Mayen and Bear Island. In the southern hemisphere Norway claims supremacy of Queen Maud Land and a couple of islands. Approximately one-third of the mainland lies north of the Arctic Circle, and some 40 percent of its area are more than 600 m above sea level. Norway is divided into 19 counties and 435 municipalities. The majority of cities and towns are located along the coast. The thick crust of the Norwegian mainland has two main elements: Precambrian bedrock and the caledonian mountain range. The precambrian bedrock is mainly made up of gneisses and granites and predominates in the northern part of the country, and also in parts of South Norway. In between these regions, Precambrian dominates the crust to silurian sediments from the caledonian mountain range. The continental shelf west of South Norway contains sources of oil and gas down to 5,000 m below sea level. The Oslo-field, representing an anomaly in the geology of South Norway, emerged at the end of the carbonic period. The area was dominated by intense, volcanic activity during most of the permian period. Its rocks consist of cambrosilurian sediments and permian eruptives and sediments mainly fossiliferous marls and chalks. The postglacial elevation of the Scandinavian peninsula reached its greatest heights in the western part of the Norwegian mainland. The slopes to the west of the watershed are steeper than the slopes to the east and south. Valleys east of the watershed are long and open and run south-east and south. Valleys west of the watershed tend to run either parallel or perpendicular to the coastline. They are generally deeper and steeper. Most of North Norway remains on the west side of the watershed of the Scandinavian peninsula. The climate is a consequence mainly of Norway's closeness to the Arctic region and Norway's geographical situation as part of the North-Atlantic water system. Due to the prevailing westerly winds coming from the Atlantic and also the Gulf Stream, the country has a higher average, annual temperature than one should expect on the basis of its high northern latitude. The average temperature increased from 1870 to 1930 when it reached a peak; after a tray around 1970 the temperature again started to increase and has in the 1990's in many places reached the level of 1930. The average, annual temperature is +6º to +8º Celsius in coastal areas of South Norway; in the inland and in the northernmost part the average, annual temperature is 2° to 6° Celsius. Precipitation varies considerably from place to place and from season to season. South Norway, on the west side of the water-shed, receives the greatest amounts up to 3-5 m per year. On the other hand, some places east of the watershed and in northernmost Norway have an annual precipitation as low as 300-400 mm. The number of sun-hours per year is small. It varies from a low of 1200 in western parts of the country to a high of 1700 in southernmost Norway. In Norway the main industries are in decreasing order of the magnitude of the gross domestic product: oil production, manufacturing, mining and quarrying, wholesale and retail trade, transport and communication, dwelling, financial services, electricity supply, construction, ocean transport and oil drilling, agriculture, forestry and fishing. The majority of the Norwegian population are caucasians. The country has more than four million inhabitants, mainly of germanic descend, and several racial minorities of which 20,000 to 30,000 lapps comprise a significant group. At present there are about 260,000 immigrants from all over the world (of whom 40 000 are second generation). Some 20 percent of the immigrants are from northern parts of Europe and 50 percent from third world countries. Except from a few occasions in the nineteenth century the population has increased steadily from a total of 724,000 inhabitants in 1769 to 4,478,000 in 2000. Infant mortality has been decreasing since the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1999 the infant mortality in Norway was 4 deaths per 1000 live births. Expectation of life is now 75.5 years for males and 81.3 years for females. In 1996 the main causes of death were heart diseases with 19,500 deaths, cancer with 10,600 deaths. Deaths from heart diseases or cancer represents respectively 44 percent and 24 percent of the total amount of deaths in 1996.
Cancer registration
The Cancer Registry of Norway is a population-based registry that has systematically collected notifications on cancer since 1952. Physicians are by law obliged to report all cancers and precancerous lesions. For this purpose, the Registry provides standardized clinical forms. Another important source of information are copies of pathology reports. If the Registry has received a report from a pathological laboratory, but no clinical form, the physician will be asked to notify the Cancer Registry about the patient. In cases of conflicting information from physician and pathologists, the reports are further investigated. When a cancer case is discovered post-mortem a copy of the autopsy report is sent to the Cancer Registry. Causes of deaths are compared with data from Statistics Norway at least once a year. Statistics Norway provides a copy of death certificates on persons that are not reported to the Registry. If incongruity between the autopsy report or the death certificate and the data of the Cancer Registry is revealed, the hospital or physician in question will be contacted in order to clarify the case history of the deceased person. By the end of 1999 the Cancer Registry¹s database contains information on approximately 892,000 cancer cases and 777,000 persons with premalignant conditions. The database is continuously updated.