Childhood cancer (0--14 years) mortality rates for six cancer sites, including bone, kidney, eye, Hodgkin's disease, non-Hodgkin's lymphomas, leukaemias, plus total cancer mortality were computed for subsequent calendar periods from 1955 to 1997, and graphically presented for 16 Western European countries, seven Eastern European countries, plus the European Union as a whole. All Western European countries showed substantial declines in mortality from leukaemias and from all neoplasms considered from the mid-1960s onwards, for an average fall over 60%, and an estimated total number of approximately 4500 avoided deaths per year. Favourable trends were observed also in Eastern Europe, but the declines started later (i.e. around the mid-1970s or the late 1980s), and were only approximately 30%.