Health experts are urging people to avoid two types of food as cases of a deadly cancer increase among young people.
Dr Andy Chan, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, spoke to Jonathan Wolf on the ZOE podcast about colon cancer (also known as bowel or colorectal cancer) and discussed how it's on the rise among young people. He also explained how an intergovernmental medical agency that forms part of the World Health Organization in the US believes there is "compelling evidence" that certain foods are "risk" factors for this cancer.
Dr Chan said: "We've started to see really sharp increases in the incidence of colorectal cancer in people under the age of 50. So, now I think people have to appreciate that this is a disease that affects younger adults as well as older adults, and people need to be thinking about it, you know, at increasingly younger ages."
He further added: "What we know is that red meat intake and processed meat is a risk factor for colon cancer. So, the International Agency for cancer research did a very comprehensive review of dietary risk factors for colon cancer.
"And they felt the most compelling evidence was for red and processed meat being a risk factor. So, reducing your intake of red and processed meat as much as possible is one key way that you can reduce your cancer risk."
Dr Chan, who is also the programme director for gastroenterology training at Massachusetts General Hospital, also revealed that limiting alcohol was another "increasingly important" factor and "probably important to do", reports Gloucestershirelive. Bowel cancer can be found anywhere in the large bowel, including the colon and rectum.
Its seriousness depends on how large the cancer is, if it has spread and your overall health, according to the NHS. It remains one of the most common types of cancer in the UK. Bowel cancer screening could pick up the disease early, meaning it may be simpler to treat.
Symptoms include changes in your stool (softer stool, diarrhoea or constipation), more or less frequent bowel movements, blood in your stool, and bleeding from your bottom. Early warning signs also include a persistent urge to have a bowel movement, stomach pain, lumps in your stomach, bloating, weight loss and fatigue.
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