According to a new survey, if no one in Norway was overweight, at least 37,000 cancer cases could be avoided over the next ten years.
The study, published in the European Journal of Cancer, is a collaboration between several Nordic researchers. It is being discussed in Today’s Medicine and VG newspaper.
Researchers believe that a total of 205,000 cancer cases could be avoided in the Nordic countries if there was no obesity. In Norway alone, that would be 37,245 cases in the period between 2016 and 2045.
The researchers emphasise that it is unrealistic to claim that all cases could be avoided.
Therese Andersson, Assistant Professor at the Karolinska Institutet i Stockholm, and leading author of the study, said in an email to VG newspaper, that ’We can show that a reduction in obesity would lead to fewer cases of cancer.’
The risk of 13 types of cancer increases if you are overweight, including breast cancer, colon cancer, rectal cancer, ovarian cancer. and liver cancer.
Source: NTB scanpix / Norway Today