Cancer Surges 79% In Young People: Poor Metabolic Health to Blame?

– Emerging evidence suggests that blood sugar, and metabolic health are linked to cancer incidents. In today's show, we're gonna talk about the rise in early onset cancers in young people that is 30 and 40 year olds, and the connection with early onset cancer, as well as all cancers and metabolic health. Here's a report from CNN titled, “Cancer diagnosis rates are going up in young adults, study finds, driven largely by rises in women, and people in their 30s.” Now, the actual article that this media was reporting on is titled, “Global trends in cancer incidents, death, burden and risk factors of early onset cancer between the years 1990 and 2019.” We're gonna really focus in on this, and then transition and talk about why blood sugar health, and metabolic health are so important, and why people are not connecting the dots. You know when you go to a hospital or your friends or relatives are diagnosed with a different ailment or condition, oftentimes the hospitals will give you food recommendations, and healthy eating guides, and these eating guides are loaded with carbohydrate enriched foods. And we're gonna talk about strong associations with elevated fasting glucose, and the elevations in hemoglobin A1C, and prevalence of pre and diabetes, pre-diabetes, as well as diabetes, and the associations with cancer. I think this is really important, but let's first talk about the trends, specifically in early onset cancer. So the scientists say, “Global incidents of early onset cancers increased by 79.1%, and the number of early onset cancer deaths increased by 27.7% between the years 1990 and 2019.” “Early onset breast, tracheal, bronchus and lung, stomach and colorectal cancers showed the highest mortality, and Disease Associated Loss of Life Years.” This is important to recognize because as I share with you in these images here, you can see the different prevalences, and there's also the rates of the Disease Associated Loss of Life Years. And this is why this conversation is so important in terms of prevention because the medical system, and the tools that oncologists are using, they are helping people a little bit, but if you look at the Disease Associated Loss of Life Years, we're not extending lifespan once people are diagnosed with these cancers very significantly. We're not making great strides in terms of helping people to live more fuller lives once they have cancer. It's more important that we focus on preventing cancer from arising, and manifesting in the first place. And it turns out, we're not really doing a good job at that per this recent report, especially in younger people. And I really wanna get into the links between metabolic health and cancer. But first friends, if you're enjoying this content, hit that like button. Please share this with a friend, especially a friend who is consuming a lot of processed foods. sugars, sodas, cookies, crackers, cakes, hot dogs, french fries. All these foods that cause metabolic dysfunction. You know, metabolic health is really important.

Today we're focusing on metabolic health. A tool that may help you is a Berberine fasting accelerator by Myoxcience. There's close to 200 reviews from people just like you that are using this to help cut some of the hyper palatable food cravings that we can succumb to in the evening. The ice cream, the cookies, crackers, treats and things like that. You can check this out over at Myoxcience.com. Berberine has been used for over 3,000 years in traditional Chinese medicine. There's a lot of good research to support the premise that Berberine helps optimize metabolic health. You can check out some of the reviews. I'll put links below. You can take one to two capsules with your last meal to help kickstart that fast and curb some of those food cravings. I'll put links below there.

But let's go back to the article here. And this is in BMJ Oncology reporting in a more layman-friendly manner on the actual article that I was just reporting from, and this is titled “Shifting tides. The rising tide of early onset cancers demand attention from our public health apparatus.” You know, we focus so much on COVID. We focus so much on staying home, on public masking and so forth, but why aren't we talking about why 30 somethings and 40 somethings are now getting cancers that historically only people in their 50s and 60s used to get? The scientists say, “Well, increasing age is a major non-modifiable risk factor for cancer. The incidence of early onset cancers largely accepted to be an adult under the age of 50 is increasing.” “In addition, cancer is historically perceived to be more common in older age groups are now being diagnosed in younger adults, including colorectal, breast, esophageal, gastric, and pancreatic cancers among others.

Now, it's important to acknowledge. We've talked a lot about the Warburg effect, and this is the aerobic fermentation of glucose that is a characterization of neoplastic or cancer cells. And these specific cancers that we see increasing in young people are characterized by having futures of this Warburg effect, and this fermentation of glucose. So this is where we're gonna transition this content to focus on the association between carbohydrate, and sugar consumption and its links with cancer onset and diagnosis because it's important to acknowledge that you know you can't control your genetics. You can control your environment. Your exposure to persistent organic pollutants, and chemical carcinogens, but you're eating three to four times a day. You're snacking. You're consuming food. So if you understand that those foods can impact your metabolic health, and that your metabolic health can create the environment that could potentially foster or prevent the onset of cancer, that is really important. So let's transition this conversation to focus on the association with glucose as a marker and risk factor for cancer. So this article published in BMC Cancer in 2014 titled, “Serum glucose and risk of cancer. A meta-analysis.” This included 19 studies in this primary analysis, and showed a relative risk of in 32%. That is having a fasting glucose above 125 milligrams per deciliter increases your risk for cancer by some 32%.

In conclusion, the study and I'll share with you these forest plot analysis finding. You know all the different outcomes from these various different studies that have been published as early as, I believe it was 1994, and it most recently it included in this analysis, again, the 2014 analysis was 2012. But you look here, breast cancers, all cancers, prostate cancers, colorectal cancers, endometrial cancers. All of these different cancers, there appears to be a strong correlation with elevated fats and glucose, and the prevalence of cancer. And so there is a risk. So if you are not optimizing your metabolic health with nutrition. With sleep. With exercise. With time-restricted feeding. With not consuming their hyper palatable processed foods that by the way, here's an image from a friend who works in healthcare. Two different images about the food recommendations from the dietetics department in major US hospitals here locally in Seattle, which lest I remind you, a lot of people around here say they practice, they follow the science. They look at the evidence, and they make evidence-based decisions, and practice so-called evidence-based medicine. And this is what the dieticians are recommending for people with dementia and Type 2 diabetes. I have a friend who's very much involved in healthcare and goes to people's homes, and literally is taking screenshots of these from the hospital, and these are on the patient's refrigerator. Helping people ostensibly to make better food choices. You might notice cookies, french fries, vanilla wafers, cereal. These are the recommendations that science-based institutions are recommending people with Type 2 diabetes eat. Now, with that in mind, let's consider what this analysis of 19 different studies has shown is related to glucose, and the prevalence of cancer. “A positive association between serum glucose, and risk of cancer was found. The underlying biologic mechanisms remain to be elucidated, but our subgroup analysis suggests that insulin and the IGF-1 axis do not fully explain the association.” We've heard a lot about Insulin-like Growth Factor 1, and its associations with protein consumption, and possible links of cancer. We've talked about that in other videos. I can link that there.

I did a presentation in in Bogota, Columbia, and we posted that last Sunday. So if you want to dive into that, I think around minute 47, is when we really focused on the association with protein, IGF-1 and mortality. So there's not a clear cut association with protein consumption and IGF-1 is related to mortality. And it turns out, that there's not a really strong association with IGF-1 insulin and cancer, and glucose consumption herein. So it's important to understand there are other mechanisms, and it probably has to do with the 1918 postulate by Otto Warburg where he found that neoplastic cells change their metabolic phenotype, and start to ferment glucose, and that may help foster the cancer environment further evading the immune system, so that cancer cells can grow unopposed, and that is really why this is problematic. So the scientists say, “These findings are of public health importance as measures to reduce serum glucose via lifestyle and dietary changes could be implemented in the context of cancer mortality.”

Again, why aren't we hearing more about this? We see school lunches. We see what people at Major Fortune 500 companies are eating for their lunch. And the vending machines, even at health clubs. I mean, you go to a gym nowadays, it's embarrassing what they are offering to people who are trying to be healthy. Muffins and Gatorade and soda pop. That's one of the reasons why I quit my gym here that I was a member of, lest I remind you for eight years and it's touted to be one of the most progressive, and advanced health clubs here in the Northwest out in the Seattle area. They have coke in the cafeteria, literally soda pop. Now, it's because people are consuming it, but you need to be congruent through and through, and have some integrity in terms of your mission. If you're trying to provide a safe space for people to exercise and improve their health, why are you offering soda, and the worst of the worst donuts, and these things in the health club? Anyway.

Going on to another study that was published in Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention. The title of this particular paper that was published in June of 2020 is, “Diabetes Glycated Hemoglobin.” Also known as Hemoglobin A1C. “And Risk of Cancer in the UK Biobank Study.” “We examined the associations between diabetes. Hemoglobin A1C and cancer risk in the UK Biobank data using 467,000 participants. 54% of which were women. Followed for an average period of seven years.” “Compared with normal Hemoglobin A1C levels, the increased risk category was positively associated with cancers of the colon, liver, bladder and lung among smokers. And the high risk category was associated with risk of cancer of the esophagus, liver, pancreas and bladder. And actually for whatever reason, a decreased risk of prostate cancer, which I think is quite interesting. Now for even more confirmation about the association with high glucose carbohydrate consumption and cancer, I wanna share with you this paper that just came out this month. The title is “Overall plant-based for animal-based low carbohydrate diets, and all cause and cost-specific mortality. A systematic review and the dose-response meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies.” I know there's a lot of jargon here.

Essentially, what these scientists say is, “Non-communicable diseases.” Like cancer heart disease that we're talking about here. “Account for 74% of all deaths worldwide.” And what they found in this analysis of 421,000 participants, the risk of cancer mortality increased literally with the increases in carbohydrate content of the diet. Now it turns out, we're gonna talk about in other videos, the importance of protein. There is an association between the protein to carbohydrate ratio in your diet, and its association with all cause mortality. So basically you know, you don't have to be very low carb, but you just need to consume at least two times as much protein as carbohydrates. That's what this study found.

So about 30% of your calories should be coming from protein, and that's what the study found. And we did a full deep dive on that paper that I'll post in another video if you're interested in learning more about protein and weight loss and muscle preservation. But it turns out that protein to carbohydrate ratios are actually probably more important than the overall quantity of carbohydrates in the diet because when you're consuming a very high carbohydrate enriched diet, you're mostly consuming low-quality foods. And these are processed foods, french fries, cookies, crackers. Things that we've been, that you shouldn't be eating, and that unfortunately dieticians are actually promoting, which I don't think is really good medicine. So we want to help prevent people from getting cancer. Please share this video with a friend or family member who is still consuming sugar. Still consuming a lot of processed foods. Those processed foods are not only increasing your risk for all sorts of non-communicable diseases, which account for three in 10 deaths here in the world, but specifically cancer, which is on the rise in young people. And sadly, as we were talking about offline with Sam, this is not surprising.

The foods that people are eating now are really highly processed, are unhealthy, and they just don't know. A lot of people just don't know that they're problematic. And so we need to share this information with them so they have a better idea of like how metabolic health is tethered to health of the heart and preventing cancer, and also dementia and Alzheimer's, which collectively comprise the top three leading causes of death. So again, thank you for being here. Thanks for watching all the way through. Appreciate you hitting that like button, and sharing this video with a friend. And we'll catch you on a future episode down the road.