Junk food is being blamed for the worrying rise in cancer cases among the young, but something more is going on, and it’s likely linked to the gut microbiome. Bryan Hubbard reports
Cancer has usually been a disease of the elderly; half of all cancers are diagnosed in people over age 70. But there’s a disturbing trend that has never been seen before: cancer is now increasingly becoming a disease of the young.
More millennials—people aged 28–43—are developing cancers that were once the preserve of the elderly. The same phenomenon is occurring in Generation X, those born between 1965 and 1980.
Seventeen of the 34 most common cancers, including breast, pancreatic, gastric, liver, uterine, gallbladder, testicular and colorectal, are becoming more common in younger people. And they can be fatal.
Researchers from the American Cancer Society noticed the trend when they analyzed data from 23,654,000 cancer cases in the US collected between 2000 and 2019, and it seems to be accelerating. Cancer of the small intestine, kidneys, pelvis and pancreas were three times higher in those born in 1990 than in people born in 1955, the Baby Boomers.1
The rate among those born in 1990 was 12 percent higher for ovarian cancer and 169 percent greater for uterine cancer than in those with the lowest incidence of cancer. Sadly, the death rate was also increasing in the younger age groups—even as cancer rates were declining in older age groups.
The researchers don’t know why cancer has become a disease of the young. They postulate that it could be something to do with exposure to carcinogens in childhood, such as from environmental toxins and ultra-processed foods (UPFs)—foods chemically enhanced to extend shelf life.
They would be right to suspect UPFs, say researchers from the University of Bergen in Norway. UPFs are addictive foods and drinks that make up 60 percent of the standard Western diet, and it’s a trend that is having a big impact on our health. UPFs aren’t only driving the obesity epidemic but are also responsible for the surge in diabetes, heart disease—and cancer.
The Bergen researchers reviewed 11 studies, nine of which discovered a “significant” link between the foods and most cancers, other than in the prostate. For every 10 percent increase in UPFs in the diet, there was a doubling of pancreatic cancer risk and a 51 percent jump in colorectal cancer risk, while the chances of developing breast cancer rose 21 percent. Overall, the risk of all cancers rose 18 percent for every 10 percent increase in UPFs.2
Not everyone agrees it’s quite so simple. Nutritionist Dr Federica Amati, a research fellow at King’s College London and author of Every Body Should Know This (Michael Joseph, 2024), says the emulsifiers in UPFs are the real culprit. Emulsifiers are additives that help bind fats and water to improve the food’s appearance and enhance its shelf life.
Emulsifiers are found in cakes, mayonnaise and sausages, among other foods, and research is linking them to bowel cancers in particular, she warns. Common emulsifiers include guar gum, xanthan gum, stearoyl lactylates and lecithin.
She notes that around 60 emulsifiers have been approved for use in food manufacture in the UK, but 171 are considered safe for human consumption in the US.
Oncologists at the front line of treating the young aren’t sure junk food is the only problem. Many patients they’re seeing are fit and slim and certainly don’t fit the stereotype of the obese person chowing down on pizza and fries.
BBC producer Molly Guinness chronicled her own fight with bowel cancer, diagnosed when she was 39, on X (formerly Twitter). “I’m one of five young people I know diagnosed with colon cancer in the last year—all of us are slim with healthy diets,” she posted. “I look around in the waiting room at the colorectal clinic—everyone I see there has a healthy BMI.”
She is a witness to the phenomenon and is one of its victims. Colon cancer rates have risen by 52 percent among people aged 25–49 since the 1990s, yet cases in older age groups have declined or at least remained stable.3
It may not just be about what we’re eating—the rise in cancers could also be about what we don’t consume. A recent study made the shocking discovery that more than half the world is malnourished—and that includes people living in the wealthy nations of the West.
Researchers from Harvard T H Chan School of Public Health reviewed data from 185 countries and discovered that most people aren’t consuming enough micronutrients to sustain health.4 They have low levels of 15 micronutrients, including calcium, iron and vitamins C and E, and the level of malnutrition could explain the epidemic of chronic diseases such as cancer.
“These results are alarming. Most people—even more than previously thought, across all regions and countries of all incomes—are not consuming enough of multiple essential micronutrients, and these gaps compromise health outcomes and limit human potential on a global scale,” said Ty Beal, one of the researchers.
Most people were low in all 15 of the micronutrients they surveyed, especially iodine, vitamin E, calcium and iron. More than half the world’s population also had low levels of vitamins B2 (riboflavin), B6 (pyridoxine), B9 (folate) and C.
We’re also deficient in vitamin D, and that could be a direct consequence of the overly cautious “safe sun” health advice—but the benefits of the sun’s ultraviolet rays far outweigh any dangers, such as an increased risk of skin cancer, say researchers from the University of Edinburgh.5
Getting more UV rays reduces the rates of death from heart disease and cancer and could increase our longevity, they say.
They analyzed data from the UK Biobank to discover the UV exposure levels of almost 400,000 people across the UK and the impact on their health. Residents of areas with higher UV levels, such as Cornwall, had lower rates of heart disease and cancer than people who lived in places with lower UV levels, such as Edinburgh or Glasgow. Overall, higher UV exposure reduced the risk of dying from heart disease by 19 percent and from cancer by 12 percent.
Sunbeds (called tanning beds in the US) can serve as an alternative to sunshine. The study found those who regularly used them had a 23 percent lower risk of heart-related death and a 14 percent lower risk of cancer than those who never did.
People with higher UV exposure had a slightly higher risk of developing melanoma, a form of skin cancer, but it didn’t increase their risk of death, the researchers said.
Overall, they found that while more sun exposure lowered the risk of developing cancer, it had an even greater effect on the risk of dying from cancer.
Leading oncologist Karol Sikora agrees something more is going on. He thinks the cancer rise in the young is somehow linked to the gut microbiome, which we now recognize as the control center of health.
“A healthy microbiome is critical for preventing bowel cancer. Gut cells bathe in the products produced by the bacteria, so it wouldn’t be surprising if some changes resulted in a higher or lower incidence of colon cancer. But it’s so complex, and there are many factors that affect the microbiome,” he says.3
One factor could be E. coli. Some experts suspect that children who contract the bug from contaminated food are more likely to develop colorectal and colon cancers when they’re older.6
Another could be the antibiotics often given to children. Researchers at Umea University in Sweden recently discovered that, in mice, the drugs interfere with the gut’s mucus barrier, a protective shield that stops unwanted bacteria from reaching the intestinal lining.
Once these bacteria get through the mucus barrier, they can trigger inflammatory responses that can be precursors to a range of chronic problems, including arthritis, heart disease and cancer.7
Some blame the Covid-19 vaccines for the unexpected rise in the excessive death rate among the young, but the phenomenon was being noticed for years before the vaccines were rolled out. While the Covid vaccines may not be responsible, other vaccines may be, and the sudden increase in shots added to the vaccine schedule coincides with the rate of cancers now appearing in young adults.
Up to 1990, children were given the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) and DTP (diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, or whooping cough) vaccines as well as a polio shot.
But after then, children—who are 34 years old (millennials) today—started to receive an additional eight vaccines in the standard schedule, including shots for Hib (type B influenza), chickenpox, rotavirus and hepatitis A. The HPV vaccine against cervical cancer is also recommended.
In all, by the age of four, a child will have received around 40 shots and boosters in the US and around 16 in the UK.
Even so, a direct cause-and-effect line between childhood vaccines and cancer cases in young adults can’t be drawn. But it’s another smoking gun—along with antibiotics, UPFs, additives and malnutrition—that could have affected their microbiome.
In the 1980s, when many of these suspects were being developed or promoted, medical science still believed the gut was sterile, washed clean by stomach acids.
Robin Warren, who died last summer, was an Australian pathologist who discovered that a bacterium, Helicobacter pylori, caused gut inflammation and ulcers. He once recalled the medical landscape at the time: “For about 100 years, the standard teaching in medicine was that the stomach was sterile, and nothing grew there because of corrosive gastric juices. So, everybody believed there were no bacteria in the stomach. When I said they were there, no one believed it.”
Perhaps it’s the younger generations who are now paying the price for this medical ignorance.
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