Excess Fat Increases Cancer Risk and Spread
It’s long been known that excess body fat, especially when concentrated in certain areas, namely the belly, increases the risk of heart disease substantially, and may have implications for increasing the risk of hundreds of other conditions and diseases. Well, now it’s been proven in studies that excess body fat decreases the body’s abilities to fight cancer adequately.
A study was done with mice and the end result with these mice was that the mice with higher amounts of body fat, or a higher BMI, were less able to fight cancer cells and more likely to have rapidly multiplying cancer cells (which means yes, they are less apt to survive this awful disease).
The study was done on mice with skin tumors, and the leaner mice with less body fat mostly due to exercise and reduced calorie consumption were much more able to kill off the cancer cells naturally than the mice with more “junk in their trunk”.
The hypothesis is that fat cells may actually emit compounds that sabotage the body’s main tumor fighting cells. This is just another reason to stay healthy by getting enough exercise and reducing fat intake, as well as eating a calorie reduced diet.
We will see much more of this research related to obesity and weight factors in the health arena, as the government is increasingly funding this type of research after WHO declared obesity to be a global epidemic.
