Cancer is a genetic disease. People are anxious to know their cancer risks, if several relatives have been diagnosed with cancer. However, due to lack population level data, their questions have no scientific answers. In our study, Swedish Family-Cancer Database was used to estimate common cancer risks for individuals with many relatives affected with cancer. We found that cancer family history, regardless of tumor type, increased individual’s cancer risk.  Our data could provide tools for cancer genetic counseling. Furthermore, the mechanism of the general susceptibility is a novel challenge to cancer research. (By Dr. Hongyao Yu, http://jmg.bmj.com/content/early/2016/09/20/jmedgenet-2016-103932 )