Obesity the leading cause of cancer in women: Study

The team of researchers from the University of Manchester found that while obese women were 8.6 percent more likely to develop cancer due to obesity, the risk was 3.2 percent for obese men.

Dr Andrew Renehan, who initiated the study said, “I must emphasize that we are trying not to be sensationalistic about this. These are very conservative estimates, and it's quite likely that the numbers are, in fact, higher.”

Using the data generated by World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer, the scientists analyzed the percentage of cancers caused by obesity in 30 European countries.

Obesity’s cancer connection
According to a recent study, more than 124,000 instances of cancers in year 2008 were caused due to excess body weight and out of these the majority of cases were women.

The present research found that there were 33,421 endometrial cancers, 27,770 post-menopausal breast cancers, and 23,730 colorectal cancers, and these three constituted 65 percent of all the 124,000 new cases caused due to obesity.

Though exact linkage between obesity and cancer has not been found, the scientists believe hormones to be the link.

Overweight people produce more hormones like ‘estrogen’ that is the leading cause of tumors. Also, people with large bellies produce more stomach acid and so are at greater risks of developing stomach and intestinal cancers.

"In the face of an un-abating obesity epidemic and apparent failure of public health policies to control weight gain, there is a need to look at alternative strategies, including pharmacological approaches,” says Dr Andrew Renehan.

He adds, “As more people stop smoking and fewer women take hormone replacement therapy, it is possible that obesity may become the biggest attributable cause of cancer in the next decade.”

Fighting obesity the only cure
According to the National Cancer Institute, even a five to ten pound reduction in weight can help in overcoming the risk of cancer due to obesity. A body mass index (BMI) of 18.5 to 24.9 is considered healthy, BMI of 25.0 to 29.9 is considered overweight, and obese people have a BMI of 30 or higher, which is dangerous.

The researchers claim sedentary lifestyles to be the largest cause of cancer among women. They recommend avoiding inactiveness and leading an active life with a daily exercise routine to stay healthy.

Dr. Renehan concludes, “We need to find the biological mechanism to help people find other ways of tackling obesity. Just telling the population to lose weight obviously hasn’t worked.”

The present research and its findings were presented by the researchers at the European Cancer Organization congress in Berlin.