Obesity, alcohol and putting off becoming a mother have been blamed for an increase in the number of women diagnosed with breast cancer.
Figures released by Cancer Research UK last week showed that one in eight British women will develop breast cancer in their lifetime. In 2008, 47,700 women were diagnosed with the disease, which is double the number recorded 30 years ago.
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Doctors have blamed the rise in cancer rates on obesity, increased alcohol consumption and the growing trend for delaying motherhood. Hormone replacement therapy is also believed to play a part.
“There are several lifestyle factors such as alcohol, weight and activity which increase the risk,” Dr Kat Arney, from Cancer Research UK, told the UK’s Daily Mail. “It is also linked to a woman’s reproductive history. If a woman starts having children earlier in life she is less at risk. A woman who does not start having children until her thirties will only have one, maybe two.”
The latest Australian figures from the National Breast and Ovarian Cancer Centre show that one in nine women will be diagnosed with breast cancer before the age of 85. In 2006, 12,614 women developed the disease, compared to just 5289 in 1982.
The centre predicts that the number of new breast cancer cases among women in Australia will be 22 percent higher by 2015, which suggests we are following the British trend.
Related: The UK is leading the fight against breast cancer
A 2009 report by the World Cancer Research Fund found that more than 40 percent of breast cancer cases could be prevented if women exercised regularly and consumed no more than one standard drink per day.
Your say: Are you worried about getting breast cancer? Do these statistics make you want to stop drinking alcohol and start exercising more? Share your thoughts with us below.
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