Worryingly, Australia is a world leader when it comes to bowel cancer.
Instead, most experts believe toxins or toxic influences in the world around us are interacting with genes to cause malignant changes.
In other words, you might unknowingly carry a gene that’s only altered when you’re exposed to a particular chemical, whereas someone else who doesn’t have that version of the gene would be unaffected.
Lifestyle and pollution, who’d have thought /s
As I visit the city today (bus), I’m not sure how people tolerate the toxic transport pollution stench :(
We consumed alllll the BPA when we were young and it was unregulated. Same with PFAs in non-stick pans and microwave popcorn bags. Probably dozens of other toxic things that are now regulated but when we were young were heavily used and consumed as we grew.
Aussies also eat a lot of sausages, pies and processed meats, which is now known to be a cancer causer - including bowel cancer. Now we’re getting to the age where damage from all the above starts to manifest as cancers.
The question is did we do all of those things at just a slightly higher rate which led to the higher rates the cancer scientists are seeing now and worrying about - because it’s not like they can go back in time and measure our environmental factors and inputs, they largely have to estimate.
Obesity is also a major causal factor for developing cancer (and bowel cancer specifically which is one the diseases increasing in incidence).
Diet might not be the only factor. We are also more sedentary at home and in the work place, and sitting for long periods of time is very bad for our health.