Obesity-related cancers rocket among millennials

Cancers linked to obesity are rising at a faster rate in younger people than in older generations, according to US scientists.

A major new study published in The Lancet – and based on millions of American health records dating from 1995 to 2014 – found that rates of certain cancers connected to obesity had gone up in US adults aged 25 to 49. “Steeper rises” were seen in the youngest age groups, says Live Science.

The report found that the rates of some of these cancers were also higher among older adults, but these increases were much smaller.

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CNN reports that six out of the 12 obesity-related cancers studied – namely colorectal, endometrial, gallbladder, kidney, pancreatic and multiple myeloma (a cancer of the bone marrow) – showed “startling increases” among younger adults. These are all cancers “typically seen in the elderly” that usually appear in patients in their sixties and seventies.

The study warns that the number of pancreatic cancers diagnosed in people older than 45 has risen by less than 1% a year, while the number diagnosed in 25-29 year-olds has risen by 4.3% a year.

Researchers say the trend could be due to decades of rising obesity with “younger generations worldwide experiencing an earlier and longer exposure to the dangers of extra weight”, reports the BBC.

Despite the alarming increase in some cancers, around half the obesity-related cancers studied had either plateaued or fallen in frequency. The researchers were unable to explain this.

Dr Ahmedin Jemal of the American Cancer Society said: “Our findings expose a recent change that could serve as a warning of an increased burden of obesity-related cancers to come in older adults.

“Most cancers occur in older adults, which means that as the young people in our study age, the burden of obesity-related cancer cases and deaths are likely to increase even more.”

The Daily Telegraph says the landmark study, which used the data of more than half the population of the US, is of major relevance to the UK where “obesity rates are rising faster than the US”. Experts warn there is a “similar threat” to Britain’s population.

“Shockingly, if the same is happening with cancer in the US it could already be happening here though as yet unreported,” says Tam Fry, chairman of the National Obesity Forum. “Such a discovery could negate our own recent advances in treating cancers but, until the NHS seriously begins to screen for obesity, as recommended by the study’s authors, we may not know.”