Early onset: why is cancer on the rise in younger people?

癌症年轻化

Babbage from The Economist

2025-05-08

38 分钟

PDF

单集简介 ...

The number of people under 50 being diagnosed with cancer has risen dramatically in recent decades. Many cases cannot be explained by a family history of disease or any lifestyle factors—such as smoking, drinking or unhealthy foods—that would otherwise put the individuals at a higher risk. Explaining this rise in early-onset cancer has therefore presented a conundrum. But clues are now emerging—is there some kind of exposure in the environment that could perhaps explain some of the cases? Host: Alok Jha, The Economist's science and technology editor. Contributors: Ann Young, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in her 30s; Mike Stratton of the Wellcome Sanger Institute; Slavea Chankova, The Economist's health-care correspondent. Thanks also to Meg Bernhard, who wrote about Ann's story in The Economist. Transcripts of our podcasts are available via economist.com/podcasts. Listen to what matters most, from global politics and business to science and technology—subscribe to Economist Podcasts+.

The Economist.
It was January of 2023, I felt a little lump in my left breast.
And I think it was right before a menstrual cycle, so I didn't really think much of it.
Anne Young is a doctor.
In her early 30s, she was living in Boston, Massachusetts.
She was active, strong, and healthy.
She didn't drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes.
And she had no family history of cancer.
I'm a physician, so I knew that most lumps in breasts are benign,
especially in young women without any sort of prior history with pretty healthy lifestyle.
So I just kind of tucked it away and I thought to myself like,
I should probably feel for that again in a couple of months, see what it's doing.
And then it was April 4th that I felt it again.
And it kind of feels harder.
And then that night in the shower,
I was feeling it again, and actually at this point felt some lumps in my armpit.
And it was actually at that point I knew I had cancer
because there's really nothing else that causes both a lump in a breast
as well as local lymph nodes like that without any sort of trauma or infection or inflammatory condition.
And so I knew in that moment that something was deeply profoundly wrong.

> Babbage from The Economist 的更多单集

Early onset: why is cancer on the rise in younger people?

癌症年轻化

Babbage from The Economist

单集简介 ...

单集文稿 ...