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>Stop smoking, and control how much alcohol you drink, continue to be important public health messages to reduce the incidence of cancer. That obviously depend

by KhalilK 11y ago

>Stop smoking, and control how much alcohol you drink, continue to be important public health messages to reduce the incidence of cancer. That obviously depends on the type of cancer. Smokers are way more likely to get lung cancer but for other types of cancer with high mortality rates (prostate, breast, myeloma, lymphoma etc) there is no single attributable 'exposure' that is known to be the cause.

teach 11y ago
I would disagree that there's no "exposure" component for many of those other cancers. * Eating red meat * Eating processed meat * Drinking 3+ glasses of milk daily * Inadequate levels of vitamin D These are all well-known to the nutrition community to increase cancer risk.
- JshWright 11y ago
  Science in the "nutrition community" is really not very good (this isn't surprising... it's hard to control what people eat (even willing study participants), and even harder to blind anyone involved). Nutrition research is almost entirely based on cohort studies, which are certainly valuable in helping our understanding, but are not great at rigorously proving anything. This isn't a slight on the field of nutrition research, it's just a really hard problem to solve. Much harder than many people tend to think... I think it's overstating it a bit so say those things are "well-known". There are some indications that those things may result in slight increases of risk for certain types of cancer.
  - teach 11y ago
    My wife has a PhD in nutrition, so I don't think it's overstating things at all. We're well-aware of how nutrition studies are done and their limitations, but these are clear results shown in study after study for years. I would seriously question the credentials of any PhD nutrition researcher at a decent university that disputed any of those factors.
- wordbank 11y ago
  > Drinking 3+ glasses of milk daily Huh? There's some correlation with prostate cancer[1] but that's it. [1] http://www.pcrm.org/health/health-topics/milk-consumption-and-prostate-cancer http://www.pcrm.org/health/health-topics/milk-consumption-an...
  - teach 11y ago
    Walter Willett has published some good research on the link between milk and cancer. It's in his book, and he spoke on it when my wife and I went to go see him speak recently, but I don't have a good non-blog link to give you right now.
- jasallen 11y ago
  Wow. No. Just no. This comment is so wrong, to remotely compare any of these things to smoking and drinking. And even if we stipulate (even if, since the science is poor) that these are contributing factors, nobody thinks they increase risk enough to make a dent in the statistics we're talking about here.
  - blacksmith_tb 11y ago
    I think nobody may be a bit of an exaggeration, e.g. "The risks of a high-protein diet are even comparable to smoking, the researchers said."[1] 1: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/diet-high-in-meat-proteins-raises-cancer-risk-for-middle-aged-people/ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/diet-high-in-meat-...
    - cesarbs 11y ago
      High protein or high in red meat? There's a huge difference there. If I eat a high protein diet with my protein coming from e.g. soy, am I still under the same risk?
    - JshWright 11y ago
      The study that article is based on (well, there are several layers of 'articles' between the SA article and the actual study) is particularly bad (in a field where bad research is pretty much the norm)... http://www.marksdailyapple.com/will-eating-red-meat-kill-you/ http://www.marksdailyapple.com/will-eating-red-meat-kill-you...
JauntTrooper 11y ago
Smoking also increases the risk of cancer of the pancreas, liver, kidneys, esophagus, stomach, colon, cervix, breast, and bone marrow. The link to lung cancer is the most high profile (and rightly so -- 80% to 90% of all incidences of long cancer are primarily attributed to smoking), but its carcinogenic effect can be seen all over the body.
tahssa 11y ago
And, apparently, smoking can actually prevent endometrial cancer; so yeah, no silver bullet for them all. Note: Obviously I'm not advising anyone to smoke.

by KhalilK 11y ago

teach 11y ago

I would disagree that there's no "exposure" component for many of those other cancers. * Eating red meat * Eating processed meat * Drinking 3+ glasses of milk daily * Inadequate levels of vitamin D These are all well-known to the nutrition community to increase cancer risk.

JshWright 11y ago
Science in the "nutrition community" is really not very good (this isn't surprising... it's hard to control what people eat (even willing study participants), and even harder to blind anyone involved). Nutrition research is almost entirely based on cohort studies, which are certainly valuable in helping our understanding, but are not great at rigorously proving anything. This isn't a slight on the field of nutrition research, it's just a really hard problem to solve. Much harder than many people tend to think... I think it's overstating it a bit so say those things are "well-known". There are some indications that those things may result in slight increases of risk for certain types of cancer.
- teach 11y ago
  My wife has a PhD in nutrition, so I don't think it's overstating things at all. We're well-aware of how nutrition studies are done and their limitations, but these are clear results shown in study after study for years. I would seriously question the credentials of any PhD nutrition researcher at a decent university that disputed any of those factors.
wordbank 11y ago
> Drinking 3+ glasses of milk daily Huh? There's some correlation with prostate cancer[1] but that's it. [1] http://www.pcrm.org/health/health-topics/milk-consumption-and-prostate-cancer http://www.pcrm.org/health/health-topics/milk-consumption-an...
- teach 11y ago
  Walter Willett has published some good research on the link between milk and cancer. It's in his book, and he spoke on it when my wife and I went to go see him speak recently, but I don't have a good non-blog link to give you right now.
jasallen 11y ago
Wow. No. Just no. This comment is so wrong, to remotely compare any of these things to smoking and drinking. And even if we stipulate (even if, since the science is poor) that these are contributing factors, nobody thinks they increase risk enough to make a dent in the statistics we're talking about here.
- blacksmith_tb 11y ago
  I think nobody may be a bit of an exaggeration, e.g. "The risks of a high-protein diet are even comparable to smoking, the researchers said."[1] 1: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/diet-high-in-meat-proteins-raises-cancer-risk-for-middle-aged-people/ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/diet-high-in-meat-...
  - cesarbs 11y ago
    High protein or high in red meat? There's a huge difference there. If I eat a high protein diet with my protein coming from e.g. soy, am I still under the same risk?
  - JshWright 11y ago
    The study that article is based on (well, there are several layers of 'articles' between the SA article and the actual study) is particularly bad (in a field where bad research is pretty much the norm)... http://www.marksdailyapple.com/will-eating-red-meat-kill-you/ http://www.marksdailyapple.com/will-eating-red-meat-kill-you...

JauntTrooper 11y ago

Smoking also increases the risk of cancer of the pancreas, liver, kidneys, esophagus, stomach, colon, cervix, breast, and bone marrow. The link to lung cancer is the most high profile (and rightly so -- 80% to 90% of all incidences of long cancer are primarily attributed to smoking), but its carcinogenic effect can be seen all over the body.

tahssa 11y ago

And, apparently, smoking can actually prevent endometrial cancer; so yeah, no silver bullet for them all. Note: Obviously I'm not advising anyone to smoke.