Healthy food and lifestyle help reduce cancer risk
REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA— General Chairperson of the Foundation Cancer Indonesia (YKI), Prof. Aru Wisaksono Sudoyo, said the importance of maintaining a healthy diet food healthy, nutritious and safe for body health as part of efforts to prevent cancer.
“We must remember that our environment and our lifestyle and our diet are factors cancer risk which we have to incorporate into healthy steps in providing in serving good food,” Aru said in a virtual talk World Food Day, Ensure Availability of Healthy Food in Jakarta, Friday (15/10).
Aru said that the quality of food and food packaging is important, especially avoiding those containing carcinogens that form cancer.
Thus, the public needs to be educated to avoid carcinogenic food and packaging, because if they do not understand, then residents can eat food that contains carcinogenic ingredients that can cause cancer and endanger health.
Aru said 5 percent of cancers are caused by genetic or hereditary factors, while 90-95 percent of risk factors that cause cancer come from the environment, including lifestyle and food consumed.
Foods that are carcinogenic or cause cancer depend on the food, the way the food is processed and the food packaging.
Cancer itself takes time to reach the level of being able to feel or see a lump or cancer symptom. That means actually still had time to prevent cancer before cancer develops, namely from the lifestyle and food consumed.
“We rarely think of food as a risk factor for cancer because cancer takes between 10 and 20 years to develop. So the cancer that a 55-year-old patient had actually started from abnormal cell division that went undetected and couldn’t be overcome by the body at the time. He is in his 30s,” said Aru.
He said smoking was a risk factor for cancer by as much as 30 per cent but food made up a greater proportion at 35 per cent.
Therefore, one must be careful in consuming food so as not to cause carcinogenic substances to enter the body. In addition to consuming healthy, nutritious and safe foods, what is important to do to prevent cancer is to maintain weight and exercise.
The types of foods that can increase the risk of cancer are meats that are processed by smoking, salting, canning and preserving such as some packaged sausages and nuggets, and grilled meats.
Preservatives and additives can also trigger the growth of cancer cells. Consumption of sugar and refined carbohydrates, and alcohol can also increase the risk of cancer.
Consumption of high concentrations of sugar and starchy foods can lead to type 2 diabetes and obesity thereby increasing the risk of certain cancers.
Food packaging that needs to be watched out for include: styrofoam, PFA-coated packaging, and canned packaging.
Therefore, Aru invites the public to prevent cancer from an early age, among others, by avoiding the consumption of food or drinks containing carcinogens, adopting a healthy lifestyle, exercising regularly, maintaining weight, conducting early detection of cancer and cancer screening.
In addition, all parties can collaborate and work together to improve education to the public in order to provide information and understanding to prevent cancer, including the importance of eating good and healthy food for consumption and avoiding carcinogenic food or drinks.
source: Between
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