Study: Fat Causes 90,000 U.S. Cancer Deaths a Year

AP via Foxnews.com ^ | 4/24/03 | AP

[jalisco555]

Losing weight could prevent one of every six cancer deaths in the United States -- more than 90,000 each year, according to a sweeping study that experts say links fat and cancer more convincingly than ever before.

Researchers spent 16 years evaluating 900,000 people who were cancer-free when the study began in 1982. They concluded that excess weight may account for 14 percent of all cancer deaths in men and 20 percent of those in women.

[Old Professer]

Correction: 5'9" @ 205 pounds gives you a 30.2 BMI - almost 4 full points above high normal (24.9)

I mistakenly entered 71" the first time I ran the numbers for your height.

You fat, boy.

[goodseedhomeschool]

What amuses me (not that this articel is in any way funny) is the constant bombardment of anti-smoking commercials we see, and yet, if they were to attack fat folks the way they do smokers, well, need I say more?

[goodseedhomeschool]

"article" oops. :(...

[Revolting cat!]

It's transparent that BMI was calculated to include as many of us as possible. If I'm not mistaken, there has been at least one "correction" to it after protests from non-obese people BMI marked as obese. The bigger class of fatsos, the bigger the size of the problem presented to the media and the purse string holders in all the federal and local governments.

Another disguised key fact, which only one article I have read exposed, is that the so-called "obesity epidemic" affects mostly, almost exclusively, the lower social classes in this classless communist (in this respect at least) society. And as we know, the professional socialists in our government are most concerned about serving the easily manipulable, dependable voters among the lower classes (without ever admitting it.)

[aruanan]

Researchers spent 16 years evaluating 900,000 people who were cancer-free when the study began in 1982. They concluded that excess weight may account for 14 percent of all cancer deaths in men and 20 percent of those in women.

"Because of the magnitude and strength of the study, it's irrefutable," said Dr. Donna Ryan, head of clinical research at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge. "It's absolutely convincing. And therefore it's frightening."

It raises levels of insulin, prompting the body to create a hormone which causes cells to multiply.

Donna's not thinking well. Looking at the last sentence quoted above, I bet they didn't control for level of physical activity. This has been typical of most of these studies relating body weight to disease and a major confounder in the data. In very large (no pun intended) studies relating weight to morbidity done at the Cooper Institute in Dallas, TX by Stephen Blair and others, much of the morbidity due to excess weight is actually due to the decrease in physical activity that initially led to and reinforced the gain in body fat. Some of these studies have shown that obese adult men who had sufficient activity were much less likely to die from a variety of causes than were lean men who were physically inactive.

In a meeting for the students in our department when Dr. Blair was here as the featured speaker at the annual Lydia J. Roberts Seminar, he told us that he and others had questioned researchers about why they had not included physical activity level as a variable to be controlled in their experiments. They just hadn't thought it was important. Think of that. A variable that determines one's metabolic state, one's levels of endocrine signaling, one's level of cardiovascular fitness was something that they just didn't much thought to. Donna needs to remember that what she doesn't know can be as important as what she thinks she does know.

[aruanan]

Something else that's not being considered is how many deaths are prevented by high average levels of nutrition. Earlier in U.S. and British history, there were much higher rates of deaths due to organ failure because incomplete tissue development from inadequate nutrition. Considering that the average life span has continued to go higher and higher shows that some deaths are merely being traded for others--but not at a rate to offset the increase in lifespan. So even if carrying a lot of fat can cause cancer, the economy and lifestyle that promotes such obesity also results in a lower overall deathrate at earlier ages. It's just a matter of pluses outweighing minuses.

[altura]

Lara is gonna disappear entirely if she loses any more weight.

You could cut yourself on her cheekbones right now.

[DrNo]

My point is simply that the proportion of women (or men) who are obese has no logical connection with the STRENGTH of the association of obesity with cancer!

[altura]

Or big bones! (ha)

[altura]

sitting at the computer ....

now, you've stopped preachin' and one to meddlin'

[altura]

I hope you didn't use the Yahoo BMI search. It is very weird, using my exact same height and weight but changing my age, it told me I needed to lose weight and that I was seriously underweight and didn't have enough insulation!

I hurried to the fridge at once for more insulation.

[GrandMoM]

now, you've stopped preachin' and gone to meddlin' ....ain't that what grandmoms do best??????

....I've been known to sit and Freep a little to long myself.

[rector seal]

"I'm confused, which is worse, being overweight, or smoking?"

Although it is politicaly incorrect to say overweight is worse than smoking from an overall mortality perspective.

I also lost 70 lbs while quiting smoking and doing both has statisticaly increased my life from 2003 to 2015 when I may die at age 68 ( useless social security ).

[Qwerty]

"not to mention no exercise, sitting in a recliner, watching tv an average of 8 hours per day."

For the benefit of many people reading this thread, substitute "reading FR" for "watching tv".

Although I'm sure many of these people have typing muscles of steel.

[jiggyboy]

They'll outlaw fat before they mandate people paying for their own health insurance for the consequences of their own bad eating habits, that's for sure.

[jiggyboy]

I'll go out on a limb and say that people from the south are more religious as a group. They certainly are heavier according to the USDA and FDA. So I'd say it's a coincidence but not correlation -- one does not cause the other.

[Mustang]

FLASH! This just in from the "New England Journal of Medicine":

"...Causality of death has been determined to be, in every case with 100% certainty, the process of being born..."

Mustang sends from "Malpaso" News....just living life on His terms and trying to enjoy it.

[Mustang]

Please insert a few :-D and :-)) in my above.

[Trust but Verify]

What's the BMI for 5'9", 265 lbs?

What's the BMI for 5'9", 150lbs.

Those are my before/after dimensions.

[Old Professer]

39.1 and 22.1 respectively.