Saturday, June 02, 2012

Nothing New Here

With people in developing nations like India and Pakistan adopting lazy lifestyles of the west, cancer rates are expected to soar by 75 per cent worldwide by 2030, experts have warned

-from"Lazy Lifestyles Can Up Cancer Rates in Asia" in the Times of India.

The use of the phrase "lazy lifestyle" is unfortunate.  For one thing, it seems to point to exercise issues alone.  For years, studies have pointed to the connection between an animal-based diet and cancer.  On the other hand, as I observe how hard Carol works to plan and prepare her delicious plant-based meals, "laziness" or, less pejoratively, a lack of time, knowledge, and commitment account for an unheatlhy diet.  

The "experts," cited in the Times of India article are those of the World Health Organization, as reported here in the Los Angeles Times:

A new report by the World Health Organization's International Agency for Cancer Research (IARC) suggests that the incidence of cancer worldwide will grow by 75% by the year 2030, nearly doubling in some of the developing countries. Those increases will put a much larger burden on the poorly developed healthcare systems in such countries because care of cancer is much more expensive than care for infectious diseases.

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