Promoting Healthy Lifestyles: Policy, Program, and Personal Recommendations for Reducing Cancer Risk

Many Americans say they fear cancer more than any other disease. In each of the past two years, small but encouraging decreases in cancer deaths have been recorded. But cancer still claims more than a half million lives each year in the United States, and nearly 1.5 million new cases are diagnosed annually. Tragically, two-thirds of these deaths – and\ many thousands of new cases – could be avoided. Tobacco use and environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure account for nearly a third of all cancer deaths in America, and unhealthy diets are believed to account for another third.

This book contains information for reducing cancer risk through the effects of diet, nutrition, physical activity, tobacco use, and tobacco smoke exposure on cancer risk as well as ongoing and potential actions to reduce the national cancer burden by promoting healthy lifestyles.