Doctor gives medical answer to people who think getting cancer can just be ‘bad luck’

Cancer is universally hated on - and rightly so.

According to Cancer Research UK, cancer will become 55 percent more prominent worldwide in the next 20 years and that is a seriously worrying statistic.

In Britain there is an estimated three million people living with cancer and, on average, someone is diagnosed at least every 90 seconds, says Macmillan Cancer Support.

Amid a world-wide surge in the disease, morality rates are much slower in the UK and are showing a slight decrease, which is good.

But people often wonder: "Is getting cancer just down to 'bad luck'?"

To answer the question is US-based oncologist Dr Lucas Tims.

He told the Realfoodology podcast in 2023: "Cancer is not bad luck, obviously.

"If you're a lifelong smoker, let yourself go, not exercising, you're eating junk all the time.

"Yeah in some ways that is your fault. But there are a lot of things that are out of our control but that doesn't mean that it's this mystery and that we don't know that there are actually things that cause cancer.

"And they're called carcinogens. Genes and genetic mutations do not cause cancer, despite what the mainstream messaging has been, we have a very long list of well-known carcinogens like toxins.

"The top four that I preach about are heavy metals, moulds, plastics and pesticides.

"And we're getting them not only in the air we breathe, the water we drink, but we're getting them in our food, we're getting them in our personal care products, our furniture, our clothing.

"I think that's how we've gotten to this point in time where we're seeing this massive jump in cancer diagnosis and in much younger people because, again, a lot of these toxins are what we call bioaccumulators, meaning that you inherit some of these from your ancestors."

Do pesticides on food cause cancer?

Cancer Research UK has insisted that while there may be small amounts of pesticides on the surface of the food we consume, it does not increase the risk of cancer.

The pesticide levels are low on food and do not cause a higher cancer risk for humans.

It is the responsibility of the Food Standards Agency who monitor food safety in the UK and they have determined that pesticide or herbicide levels on the surface of food is not harmful.

Meanwhile, it's always recommended to wash your fruit and veggies before you eat them to remove any possible bacteria lurking.