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Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

theguardian.com

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Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#51

Post by ulfw »

frereubu wrote: post #12
jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

A friend of mine is a cardiac nurse and get massively frustrated by the overly complex regimens that people follow while ignoring the obvious stuff. e.g. going for low-gluten diets while drinking too much alcohol and not exercising enough. In terms of food I've always loved Michael Pollen's description of healthy eating as opposed to fad diets: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

What does gluten have to do with heart health?

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#52

Post by hgomersall »

bregma wrote: post #39
jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

You want to live forever? Don't do any of the things that make living worthwhile.

Not doing exercise makes living worthwhile?

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#53

Post by Etheryte »

eggdaft wrote: post #44
pauln99 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Pollen should have said "Eat real food", and stopped there. Then our appetite will take care of itself, and won't require conscious - and ultimately - futile endeavour. And eating meat's fine (from a health perspective, if not ethical necessarily). We've been eating it for a couple of millions of years.

I’d roll back a bit on meat. It can be very fatty, particularly red meat. And it does significantly raise risks of various diseases, including cancer. If you’re going to eat it, I’d be very selective about the types and sources you consume. Humans didn’t exist millions of years ago…

I'd say this is intentionally missing the point. Where you draw the line between homo sapiens and the previous predecessor is subjective and largely arbitrary. The point is that we and our evolutionary ancestors have been eating most edible things we could get our hands on for as long as we go back.

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#54

Post by sigmoid10 »

Attummm wrote: post #49
jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

The statement, although true, is missing nuance. For example, a balanced diet is ambiguous. Does a balanced diet include fast food? How much ultra-processed food? How many carbs? Do we need to change the above answers with age or when someone is diabetic or has high blood pressure? Thus, even though almost everyone will agree with the balanced diet statement from the outset, what constitutes a balanced diet will yiel…

>Does a balanced diet include fast food? How much ultra-processed food?

There seems to be some confusion here. "Balanced" means balanced in terms of micro and macro-nutrients that the body needs. Not balanced in the ratios of ultra-processed junk food and healthy food.

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#55

Post by matsemann »

jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

The problem with that statement is that it's basically a tautology, since the words "balanced", "healthy" etc. hide all the complexities. What is a "balanced" diet? What is moderately fit? What is the definition of a healthy social life?

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#56

Post by wazoox »

Attummm wrote: post #49
jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

The statement, although true, is missing nuance. For example, a balanced diet is ambiguous. Does a balanced diet include fast food? How much ultra-processed food? How many carbs? Do we need to change the above answers with age or when someone is diabetic or has high blood pressure? Thus, even though almost everyone will agree with the balanced diet statement from the outset, what constitutes a balanced diet will yiel…

A sane diet includes exactly zero ultra processed food, I think the data is pretty clear now.

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#57

Post by sod »

Attummm wrote: post #49
jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

The statement, although true, is missing nuance. For example, a balanced diet is ambiguous. Does a balanced diet include fast food? How much ultra-processed food? How many carbs? Do we need to change the above answers with age or when someone is diabetic or has high blood pressure? Thus, even though almost everyone will agree with the balanced diet statement from the outset, what constitutes a balanced diet will yiel…

IMHO the base framework can and must be simple and unnuanced and easy to remember:

* eat as little and never drink: sugar, alcohol

* seek: stuff that feeds you and your gut biome and doesn't cause diarrhea (aka avoid ultra-processed food)

* bonus: at least once a week: fish, salad, nuts, fruits

Sure, thats not nuanced. But the message is simple: If you eat/drink sugar, alcohol or processed foods, then your body will degrade faster and your biological organism will run on pain, inflammation and fatigue.

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#58

Post by mglz »

pauln99 wrote: post #18
frereubu wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A friend of mine is a cardiac nurse and get massively frustrated by the overly complex regimens that people follow while ignoring the obvious stuff. e.g. going for low-gluten diets while drinking too much alcohol and not exercising enough. In terms of food I've always loved Michael Pollen's description of healthy eating as opposed to fad diets: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

I think Pollen should have said "Eat real food", and stopped there. Then our appetite will take care of itself, and won't require conscious - and ultimately - futile endeavour. And eating meat's fine (from a health perspective, if not ethical necessarily). We've been eating it for a couple of millions of years.

> And eating meat's fine (from a health perspective, if not ethical necessarily). We've been eating it for a couple of millions of years.

The current theory is that we developed sweating and bipedal walking to be endurance hunters, i.e. running after a prey animal until it is too exhausted to run any further. Tool use and development were also driven in part by hunting (spears, atlatl, bow and arrow, skinning knives etc.). Overall humans are omnivores, as evidenced by tooth layout. Some populations still manage to live on primarily meat-based diets (Inuit), albeit with some difficulties.

The main issue is the amount of meat: Hunting was difficult and dangerous, limiting how much meat we got. Being able to eat meat every day for almost every meal is a recent development and is a major difference to prehistorical diets. Plus, factory-farmed meat is significantly different from free-range animals w.r.t fat, hormone and antibiotics content.

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#59

Post by kerrsclyde »

jgrahamc wrote: post #8

Here's what seems blindingly obvious to me from everything I've read: eating a balanced diet, staying fit (strength and cardio), having a healthy social life, are vital for staying healthy as you age.

> having a healthy social life

This is almost always omitted when it comes to health advice I feel it is one of the most important factors. Loneliness kills!

Re: Getting fitter can reduce prostate cancer risk by 35%, study finds

#60

Post by zeteo »

chii wrote: post #45
LoveMortuus wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do think that people underestimate the dangers of prolonged stress. My hypothesis is that stress is the real killed. This might be survivorship bias, but I often see people that are above average old, smoking. That's why I think that perhaps the reduction of stress that smoking provides, could be more beneficial than the negative side. We do know that nicotine does have a neuroprotective effect and smoking does inc…

> often see people that are above average old, smoking. it's quite a sample bias, because those who you see smoking are likely quite healthy and thus is _able_ to smoke to old age (or won a genetic lottery to be able to withstand smoking). What you need to count is how many people smoke, and then the % of them dying earlier than those who don't. Otherwise, sample bias will give you the wrong conclusions, esp. if this…

Isn't it the same with exercise, though?

> Those who you see exercising are likely quite healthy and thus _able_ to exercise to old age (or won a genetic lottery to be able to withstand a lot of exercising).

> What you need to count is how many people try to exercise, and then the % of them dying earlier than those who don't

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