Experts warn of link between obesity and cancer in new report

Obesity is predicted to overtake smoking as the biggest preventable cause of cancer in UK women within 25 years, experts suggest.
Experts have warned that this link is more significant than researchers have previously thought, and have stressed for urgent action to be taken.
The report is alarming, but it is important to note that obesity can be treated with diet and exercise. Eating a diet high in healthy, real foods and cutting out sugar can help with weight loss, reducing blood sugar levels and even putting type 2 diabetes into remission.
Cancer Research UK reports that obesity increases the risk of 13 types of cancer, including kidney, breast and bowel.
Within 17 years the charity predicts that around 23,000 cases of cancers in women could be caused by excess weight, with 25,000 cases caused by smoking.
Cancer Research UK says that if the projected trends continue, obesity will overtake smoking by 2043 as a cause of cancer.
In men, the gap between smoking and obesity as cancer causes is expected to close much later because men are more likely to smoke and get tobacco-related cancers, the charity said.
“Obesity is a huge public health threat right now, and it will only get worse if nothing is done,” said Professor Linda Bauld, Cancer Research UK’s prevention expert.
“The UK government must build on the lessons of smoking prevention to reduce the number of weight-related cancers by making it easier to keep a healthy weight and protect children, as those who are overweight are five times more likely to be so as an adult.”
The government has made several proposals to reduce obesity in the UK, including making it mandatory for restaurants to list their calorie content on their menus, and for restrictions on junk food advertising of all types.
Prominent health experts are campaigning to combat the role of sugar in obesity, with Dr Aseem Malhotra, author of the Pioppi Diet, speaking in European Parliament earlier this year about how it is sugar, not fat, that is the culprit.
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