A new international study reported in Nutrients has found that certain lifestyle factors—specifically, eating diets high in animal products and smoking—have the strongest association with cancer rates compared to other risk-modifying factors.
The study used age-adjusted incidence rates for 21 cancers in 157 countries (87 with high-quality data) in 2008 with respect to diets and other factors, including per capita gross domestic product, life expectancy, lung cancer incidence rate (an index for smoking and air pollution), and latitude (an index for solar ultraviolet B doses, which enables the body to produce vitamin D). The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations provided dietary data back to 1980.
Read more of Deborah McBride’s article at the Oncology Nursing Society website.
