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Why are so many young people getting cancer?

nature.com

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Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#61

Post by p_j_w »

gopalv wrote: post #11
noIdeaTheSecond wrote: post #2

My wild guess before reading the article: unhealthy food. A big part of which is herbicides and pesticides. I will now read the article.

My personal bugbear is the lack of sleep & entirely tied to the phone for that. I remember being in my 20s and not being able to sleep, but the most distracting thing I could reach for was a pile of books in my bedside table. Now, I can't sleep, there's an endless stream of things to keep me awake. The jokes about "5G gives you cancer" is probably not as funny, if you think about the sleep you miss while you doom scr…

>The jokes about "5G gives you cancer" is probably not as funny, if you think about the sleep you miss while you doom scroll.

802.11g was good enough for that, no need for 5G.

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#64

Post by shermantanktop »

crazygringo wrote: post #43
noIdeaTheSecond wrote: post #2

My wild guess before reading the article: unhealthy food. A big part of which is herbicides and pesticides. I will now read the article.

Why would you leave that comment? An uninformed comment before you read the article isn't helping anyone.

I appreciate that comment ironically, as a concrete example of exactly how this type of conversation goes. Opinions come first, facts come later if at all, and never change the opinion.

Most people will have a pre-conceived opinion about this, just like they would have an opinion about politics. Put "Trump" or "DEI" or some other word in the title, and the exact same thing happens.

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#65

Post by socalgal2 »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #31
noIdeaTheSecond wrote: post #2

My wild guess before reading the article: unhealthy food. A big part of which is herbicides and pesticides. I will now read the article.

We are exposed to more more types of chemicals in our every day than ever before. Some offenders to me, besides herbicides and pesticides are: [1]: ubiquitous flame retardants, which in America they put in every couch, carpet, and mattress [2]: ubiquitous microplastics pollution, [3]: joint effect of Obesity and Ultra-Processed Foods [1] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2022&q=flame+retar... [2] https://scho…

Wasn't microplastics just debunked as not a thing?

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jan/13/micropla...

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#66

Post by socalgal2 »

noIdeaTheSecond wrote: post #2

My wild guess before reading the article: unhealthy food. A big part of which is herbicides and pesticides. I will now read the article.

Well since we're speculating randomly I vote for

* too much rage bait videos raising rage hormones

* too much performing for social media

* suppressing expression for fear of cancellation

* exposure to too many varieties of food/cuisine

* video games

* anime

Yes, these are all tongue-in-cheek but come on, the random speculation here is all ridiculous

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#68

Post by kypro »

Chronic inflammation is almost certainly part of this and lots of things about our modern ways of living cause higher levels of inflammation.

- Obesity and sugary drinks/food

- Various chemicals we use in agriculture, food products, cleaning, etc

- Lack of sleep

- Lack of exercise

- Stress

- Pharmaceuticals. And to be clear because I know this will be more controversial, I'm not anti-pharma, but lots of people today are being prescribed daily medication at ever young ages. We know many of these pharmaceuticals can marginally increase certain cancer risks.

- Low Vit D levels – seriously everyone should be supplementing

- Vaccines? Probably not, but I dunno... Call me a conspiracy theorist if you want, but if you're on your 5th Covid shot I feel like you might be putting your body at some marginally increased inflammatory risk there. Vaccines are quite literally deigned to induce inflammation to boost immune response after all.

- More radiation emitting devices – not sure about this one because I haven't done any research, but when I was younger people used to talk about this quite seriously and now it feels like something only conspiracy theorists say. I suspect there is some amount of truth to it even if 5G isn't going to literally give you cancer.

I think it would be more surprising if we didn't see an increase in cancer rates to be honest.

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#69

Post by talkingtab »

What I find interesting is the concept of dead food versus live food. This is just something I wonder about. For example a dead apple is one that was picked a year ago, sold today, kept in storage until now. Long shelf life - is the crucial change in our eating that I can see. When was the last time you had a fresh apple? Does the food industry want us to consider the health benefits of a dead apple versus a living apple?

Let think twinkies! You can open a package of twinkies and let it sit out for a long time. A long time. A long, long time. They you can eat it. Long shelf life means it does not succumb to digestion by random microbes etc in the environment. Does the twinkie then succumb to the random microbes in your gut? I think not, but what do I know.

Then there is living food. You can take milk, put a culture in it and let it grow for 10 hours. Instant pot, heating pad, whatever. Then you eat it. It is now filled with living cultures. It tastes better to me than any store bought yogurt, costs exactly the same as the same quantity of milk. With a chopped apple, cinnamon and a tiny bit of sugar it tastes better to me that most of the faux ice cream you get these days.

What is funny to me is the conversations we have about "ultra processed food" do no address this aspect of the issue. I keep wondering why.

Re: Why are so many young people getting cancer?

#70

Post by adrian_b »

flerchin wrote: post #62

Are more young people getting cancer? How much? What kinds?

From TFA:

"in the United States, the incidence of advanced colorectal cancer has increased by about 3% each year since around 2010 in people between the ages of 20 and 49. In 2023, colorectal cancer became the leading cause of cancer death in this age group."

Also in TFA:

"Uterine cancer and liver cancer diagnoses and deaths are rising in young women"

The increases in colorectal and liver cancers seem to point to unhealthy food, probably combined with other factors that reduce the resistance of the body to unhealthy food, like pollution, lack of physical exercise and of good sleep.

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