Behavior changes could prevent 60,000 cancer deaths a year: IOM report

If more Americans quit smoking, lost a little weight and started eating better, at least 60,000 cancer deaths could be avoided each year, according to a new report issued by a government advisory panel.

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) report recommended 12 steps that could increase cancer prevention and detection, including enforcing laws to reduce tobacco use, developing a national strategy to decrease obesity and encourage a healthy diet, and improving the public’s understanding of cancer prevention.”To save the most lives from cancer, health care providers, health plans, insurers, employers, policy makers, and researchers should be concentrating their resources on helping people to stop smoking, maintain a healthy weight and diet, exercise regularly, keep alcohol consumption at low to moderate levels, and get screened for breast, cervical, and colorectal cancer,” said the report.At a day-long symposium discussing the recommendations and cancer prevention efforts, Tim Byers, an epidemiologist at the University of Colorado and lead author of the IOM report, said that “just applying what we know” would lead to a 19% decline in new cancer cases, and a 29% decrease in deaths by 2015. That translates into prevention of 100,000 new cancer cases and 60,000 deaths from cancer, he said.”Many of the behaviours placing people at increased risk for cancer are well recognized, and calls for change are not new,” said John Seffrin, CEO of the American Cancer Society. “What is new, however, is the growing body of evidence confirming the effectiveness of interventions helping people improve their health-related behaviors.”Seffrin cited several examples where behavioral changes have led to a decrease in cancer. Declining tobacco use, for instance, has largely been correlated with a decrease in lung cancer deaths, he said.”Promoting healthy behaviors is critical to cancer prevention and early detection,” said Seffrin, who added that the rising “epidemic of obesity is deeply troubling,” and may be harder to address than tobacco use.The American Cancer Society is starting a new push for more physical activity and better nutrition, he said, noting that epidemiologists from his organization published a study in late April showing a link between obesity and increased risk of 14 types of cancer.The National Cancer Institute has also begun a new emphasis on prevention and early detection, with a goal of eliminating “the suffering and death due to cancer” by 2015, said NCI director Andrew von Eschenbach.The agency has $1.76 billion budgeted for those efforts in this fiscal year, he said.(Source: Reuters Health: Alicia Ault: June 30, 2003: Oncolink)