[Epoch Times, September 09, 2022](Epoch Times reporter Lin Nan comprehensive report) A new study finds that since 1990, adults under the age of 50 worldwide have suffered fromcancerThe number of people increased sharply.
cancerThat prevalence is on the rise in modern society is not a groundbreaking idea.According to ScienceAlert, a team of researchers at Harvard University has realized that since the 1940s and 1950s, people suffering fromlate-onset cancernumber has increased. Late-onset cancer is cancer that develops after age 50.
But what the research team wanted to study was,early onset cancer— cancer rates among people under 50 — are also increasing. To do this, they looked at people born in the 1950s and 1960s and looked at their cancer rates starting in the 1990s.
They looked at data from 14 cancer types: breast, colon (CRC), endometrial, esophageal, extrahepatic bile duct, gallbladder, head and neck, kidney, liver, bone marrow, pancreas, prostate cancer, gastric and thyroid cancer.
Global cancer data show that the prevalence of all these cancers increased between 2000 and 2012 among adults under the age of 50.
“The incidence of late-onset colon cancer (people born in the late 19th and early 20th century) began to increase in the 1950s, while the incidence of early-onset colon cancer (people born in the mid-20th century) did not start to increase, until the early 1990s,” the researchers wrote in their paper.
So, what changed that made post-1990s 50-year-olds more susceptibleearly onset cancerWoolen cloth?
One of the biggest changes is the increase in screening, which has undoubtedly helped improve the detection rate of early-onset cancers.
But that alone doesn’t seem to fully explain the change — especially as some early-onset cancers are on the rise even in countries without screening programs, the team noted.
“There also appears to be a real increase in early-onset incidence in several cancer types,” the team wrote in the paper.
In addition to being better at detecting early-onset cancers now, there is evidence that the “transition” in cancer rates actually happened earlier, around the middle of the last century.
In fact, it’s no secret that people’s lives have changed a lot since then, especially with the rise of highly processed foods, clues that show how diet, lifestyle, weight, environmental exposures and the microbiome play a role in Certain combinations are involved.
“Eight of the 14 cancer types that were on the rise in our study were related to the digestive system,” explains Tomotaka Ugai, an epidemiologist at Harvard Medical School.
“The food we eat feeds the microbes in our gut, the diet, and directly affects the composition of the microbiome, and ultimately, these changes affect disease risk and outcomes.”
Other risk factors include sugar-sweetened beverages, type 2 diabetes, obesity, a sedentary lifestyle and alcohol consumption, all of which have increased significantly since the 1950s.
Interestingly, the team noted that while adults’ sleep duration hasn’t changed much over the past few decades, children are sleeping much less than they did a few decades ago.
Of course, this study is far from conclusive, but rather a review of existing research. Therefore, the team cannot make any changes here and directly measure the impact.
They also don’t have much data from low- and middle-income countries to continue studying, but suggest that “the incidence of early-onset cancer in these countries may become increasingly prominent, potentially contributing to a global early-onset cancer pandemic”.
The team is now continuing their work and hopes to establish longitudinal cohort studies, which will involve the follow-up of young children for decades.
Responsible editor: Ye Ziwei#