Child cancer patients show common symptoms, including persistent low fever, weight loss for unknown reason and nose bleeds, said Zhi Xiuyi, a Beijing-based lung cancer expert.

Zhi also warned parents that unhealthy lifestyles greatly increase the risk of cancer, which is "a lifestyle chronic disease".

It has been scientifically proven that factors such as obesity, physically inactive lifestyle and high-calorie diet are also factors in the development of childhood cancer, he said.

"Early intervention in children's unhealthy lifestyles will greatly lower their risk of developing cancer both in childhood and adulthood," Zhang said.

For instance, without intervention, overweight children, who are usually meat lovers, often become obese adults, who face much higher risks of breast and colon cancers, he said.

"Cancers of the breast, skin and colon are more related to unhealthy lifestyles than lung and liver cancers," he said.

"The rates of these cancers are rising rapidly among Chinese people, who have become richer in recent decades and have then adopted a Western lifestyle," said Zhi.