Right, the worldwide cancer death rate is a lot lower than it is for those of us in rich countries because poor people are too busy dying of other things like malaria and malnutrition.
My "almost half" was an exaggeration, yes (and a totally unnecessary one, nobody needs to be convinced that cancer is bad) though if you also take into account the fact that heart disease disproportionately kills the overweight, if you're not overweight and in a rich country your chances of dying of cancer might well be approaching 50%.
According to the WHO, cancer is responsible for about 2:17 of all disease related deaths worldwide.
http://apps.who.int/ghodata/?vid=720
In the US, deaths from cancer lag behind those from CVD. Though they are closer. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm