Healthy Lifestyle Key To Cancer Prevention

Obesity, tobacco cause half of all cancers, presidential panel says.

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter
Thursday, August 16, 2007; 12:00 AM

Copyright © 2007 ScoutNews, LLC. All rights reserved.

THURSDAY, August 16 (HealthDay News) -- While the number of deaths from cancer have been declining, many malignancies could be prevented by exercising, eating right, maintaining a healthy weight and not smoking, a new federal report finds.

The President's Cancer Panel issues a report every year that focuses on one aspect of what is happening in the United States in terms of cancer.

This year's effort "centers on lifestyle changes, and two issues that are actually quite different," said panel member Margaret L. Kripke, executive vice president and chief academic officer at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston.

One issue is nutrition, exercise and the fight against obesity, and the other is the battle to cut tobacco use, Kripke said.

"We tried to think of what would have the biggest impact on reducing cancer mortality," she said. "If you consider that 15 to 20 percent of cancer deaths are related to obesity and another 30 percent of cancer deaths are due to tobacco use, that's 50 percent of all people with cancer."

And quitting smoking and avoiding obesity are things that people can do themselves, Kripke noted. But, as she and other experts know, it's not easy to get people to make the lifestyle changes they should.

"The most serious lack, in terms of what we know, is what motivates people to live a healthier lifestyle," she said.

The experts call for a move toward a "culture of wellness" in the United States. This culture would embrace healthy living as a goal and promote a healthy lifestyle as a way of achieving wellness.

Despite progress in diagnosis and treatment, cancer continues to account for more than a half million deaths each year in the United States, with almost 1.5 million new cases diagnosed annually. Two-thirds of these deaths, and many thousands of new cases, could be avoided through lifestyle changes, according to the report.

Tobacco is the leading cause of lung cancer, but it's also responsible for most cancers of the larynx, oral cavity and pharynx, esophagus and bladder. In addition, it is a cause of kidney, pancreatic, cervical and stomach cancers, along with acute myeloid leukemia. "We really need to get rid of tobacco," Kripke said.