Your Diet Could Raise Lung Cancer Risk by 44%, Shocking New Research Finds
Most people would be lying if they said the C-word doesn’t scare them. Along with that fear comes some common generalizations, including that lung cancer only affects smokers. However, new research found that what you eat could be raising your lung cancer risk by up to 44 percent.
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Lung cancer is the most common cancer in the world.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), lung cancer “is the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide, accounting for the highest mortality rates among both men and women.”
In the U.S., it’s the second most common cancer in both men and women, if you omit skin cancer (prostate cancer is the most common among men and breast cancer among women).
However, as the American Cancer Society (ACS) reports, “Lung cancer is by far the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S., accounting for about 1 in 5 of all cancer deaths. Each year, more people die of lung cancer than of colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined.”
There are two main types of lung cancer: Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the latter of which grows more slowly and accounts for 87 percent of U.S. cases.
For decades, it’s been established that smoking is the main driver of lung cancer. Both in the U.S. and worldwide, approximately 85 percent of lung cancer cases are caused by smoking tobacco, whether via cigarettes, pipes, or cigars.
Other well-documented causes of lung cancer include secondhand smoke, air pollution, and exposure to chemicals such as radon, asbestos, or diesel exhaust. But new research finds that your diet could also be a major risk factor.
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A new study links higher ultra-processed food consumption with an increased risk of lung cancer.
A new study, published in the respiratory journal Thorax, concluded that a higher intake of ultra-processed food (UPF) correlates with an increased risk for lung cancer.
To arrive at these findings, the researchers analyzed the health data of more than 100,000 people aged 55 to 74 from the years 1993 to 2001. “Cancer diagnoses were tracked until the end of 2009 and cancer deaths until the end of 2018,” notes a press release.
The participants completed Food Frequency questionnaires that divided what they ate into four categories:
- Unprocessed or minimally processed
- Containing processed culinary ingredients
- Processed
- Ultra processed
Examples of ultra-processed foods included ice cream and frozen yogurt, baked goods, salty snacks, breakfast cereals, instant noodles, store-bought soups and sauces, soft drinks, and hot dogs. However, the three most commonly consumed UPFs were:
- Lunch meat (11%)
- Diet or caffeinated soft drinks (just over 7%)
- Decaffeinated soft drinks (nearly 7%)
The team found that participants who consumed the most UPFs were 41% more likely to be diagnosed with lung cancer than those who ate the fewest. “Specifically, they were 37% more likely to be diagnosed with NSCLC and 44% more likely to be diagnosed with SCLC,” states the press release.
“Industrial processing alters the food matrix, affecting nutrient availability and absorption, while also generating harmful contaminants,” said the researchers, noting that packaging materials are likely also playing a role. They added that acrolein, a toxic component of cigarette smoke, can be found in grilled sausages and caramels.
“These findings need to be confirmed by other large-scale longitudinal studies in different populations and settings….If causality is established, limiting trends of UPF intake globally could contribute to reducing the burden of lung cancer,” they concluded.
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Ultra-processed foods are also linked to the rise of colon cancer in young people.
This is certainly not the first time ultra-processed foods have made headlines for their role in increasing cancer risk.
As Best Life reported last year, a study published in the journal Nutrients found that a typical Western diet high in ultra-processed foods was behind the alarming surge in colon cancer in Americans under age 50.
“A high-fat, low-fiber diet has been associated with intestinal dysbiosis, which disrupts intestinal bacterial homeostasis. An increased inflammation state characterizes dysbiosis and may promote an immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME) and suppress antitumor immune surveillance,” stated the study.
A second study published in the journal Gut had similar findings.
“It is well known that patients with unhealthy diets have increased inflammation in their bodies,” said Timothy Yeatman, MD, FACS, a physician-scientist and professor of surgery in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine and associate center director for Translational Research and Innovation at the TGH Cancer Institute, in a press release.
“We now see this inflammation in the colon tumors themselves, and cancer is like a chronic wound that won’t heal—if your body is living off of daily ultra-processed foods, its ability to heal that wound decreases due to the inflammation and suppression of the immune system that ultimately allows the cancer to grow,” he added.