Wisdom Wednesdays: We're getting cancers at a younger age globally - and scientists think they know why. Here's what you can do...

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Everyone, Welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. Today we
are going to investigate why the age of onset of
a lot of cancers seemed to be getting younger, and
it appears to be an almost global phenomenon. Now, you
may have seen in the news a few months ago
there was a headline doing the rhymes that showed an

(00:31):
explosion in bil cancer incidents in the under fifties. And
one of the leading theories as to why this was
occurring was the declining quality of our diets and specifically
the huge increase in ultra process food consumption. And the
thinking was that there were twin drivers. The crap that's

(00:51):
in ultra processed foods, such as flavor enhancers and multifiers
and preservatives that we know now damage the lining and
create an unhealthy microbiome. And then there's the double wamy
of the crowding out of nutritious food that feeds a
positive microbiome and a healthy cut lining. Clearly, if you're

(01:14):
eating more crap food, you're eating less healthy food, so
we get this double wammy effect. Now, this week I
read a thought provoking article from the Journal of the
American Medical Association Oncology that highlights increased rates of many
different cancers in younger people, and it actually explores what's

(01:37):
going on and whether or not that these increased cancers
in young people are actually a symptom of accelerated biological aging.
So let's start with the background. Traditionally, cancer has been
a disease that we associate with older age, but recently
there's been a noticeable bump or a spike in cancer

(02:00):
diagnosis among people under fifty. And we're not just talking
about borl cancer that I mentioned earlier. It's also breast cancer,
pancreas cancer, kidney cancer, and even head and neck cancers.
It appears to be global. It's growing, and it's affecting
millennials and Gen zs born in the eighties and the nineties. Now,

(02:21):
in this article, they actually suggested that some of the
usual suspects explain this, things like poor diets, sentary living, pollution,
increased microplastics, and even antibiotic overuse. Now, what if these
cancers aren't just random or lifestyle driving, but what if

(02:43):
they're actually assigned that these people are biologically older than
their birth certificates suggest So, as you will be well
were chronologically is the number on your birthy cake, and
it's a blunt instrument. Biologically, is is what's happening underneath
the hoot how your sales, tissues and organs are actually functioning.

(03:08):
And twenty years ago I actually developed a biological age
test and that was used in lots of gyms that
basically give people a needs and based on their fitness
and strength levels. But more recently there's been a lot
of these biological aging clocks that you may be aware of.
I've talked about some of them that look at the

(03:31):
aging of cells and different processes in a body, epigenetic
markers and all of these sorts of things, things like
grimm AADs that are out there and they're now used
in lots of research studies. So these studies show that
two people can both be forty, but one may have
a biological age of a sprightly thirty five and the

(03:52):
other are weary forty eight. And it's kind of like
comparing at twenty ten Toyota Corolla. It's been lovingly serviced
and driven by one very careful owner to one that's
been doing laps in a dirt track in the outback.
So when we see thirty five year olds being diagnosed
with cancers we normally associate with people in their sixties.

(04:16):
Maybe they're just aging faster. And here's a concept that
I loved that was outlined in the paper, the expose home,
and it is the total sum of everything your body's
being exposed to over time. Crap, food, pollution, stress, poor sleep,

(04:36):
poor social conditions, financial stressors. It's the whole chaotic buffet
of modern life. And if the exposed home has gone
off the reels by ultra processed diets, chronic stress, loneliness,
even trauma, lack of physical activity, all of this speeds

(04:56):
up your internal war intern and that's what's by accelerated aging.
And you will be aware that I have talked about
the different hallmarks of aging, and here's the thing. Aging
and cancer share many of the same biological pathways, and
some of those I covered in that series on the

(05:17):
twelve Hallmarks of aging, the ones where there's a very
very clear overlap or things like DNA damage that's the
big one, and mitochondrial dysfunction inflammation. Tellome are shortening, and
their suggesting is that some of the others may be
affected as well. So if you're aging faster at a

(05:37):
cellular level cancer might not wait until retirement to come knocking.
So here's the thing that we can all act on. Right,
the same behaviors that slow aging can actually help prevent
cancer if we flip them in terms of the impact
that we're having on them, or they are the behaviors

(05:59):
that we're having. So we're talking here in terms of
reducing aging and reducing your risk of cancer, doing regular exercise,
having caloric moderation. So I don't mean starvation, I just
mean not overeating. And we are a society of overfed
and undernourished individuals. What I mean by that is we're

(06:21):
consuming too much calories and their crappy calories, so our
nourishment is actually going down. That affects many of our
cellular processes. The third one is avoiding smoking, avoiding binge
drinking then would be the fourth one. Then it's about
minimizing unmanageable stress, not the stress that helps us to adapt,

(06:44):
but the stuff that actually breaks us down. And then
it's about building strong social networks, because we know that
loneliness is shocking for your health, but having good social
networks is actually very good for your health. And then
exposure to nature, having good sleep, having a sense of
meaning and purpose in your life. Basically, the lifestyle that's

(07:08):
good for your brillan, your mood and telomeres is also
the best defense against these early onset cancers. And there's
even this whole field emerging called gyro science which looks
at slowing aging itself as a way to prevent a
host of diseases, cancer included. So what does this mean

(07:30):
for all of us? Well, maybe it's time we started
looking before the age of fifty as the magic number
for cancer screening as it typically is right now, Maybe
we need biological age based guidelines because if you're thirty
eight but your biology is more like fifty eight, you
should probably be screened sooner. And it also means that prevention,

(07:51):
the fundamental stuff that I talk about all the time,
like movement, nutrition, connection, sleep, it is more powerful forever.
It's not just about how long we live, but how
soon before disease shows up. And the data in Australia
and other countries is showing that people are getting chronic

(08:12):
disease earlier and early. It's not just cancer. And this
basically say is that we are aging at a much
faster rate than we were decades ago. So the new
longevity mindset's not just about living longer, it's about not
breaking down too early. It's about increasing your health span.

(08:32):
So the big takeaway here is if early onset cancer
is a sign of accelerated aging, which it does appear
to be, then our day to day choices are more
than just healthy habits. They're actually investments in cancer prevention.
And we don't need to live like monks, but we
do need to pay attention to the life that we're
living inside of our body. And I think the big

(08:54):
thing here is really around kids, because the kids who
are walking around these days eating crap diets, not moving
very much and overwegh it. As young children and teenagers,
they will definitely be getting cancer and other diseases much
sooner than their parents. So on that tragic note, that's

(09:17):
it for me for this week. Catch you next time.