What’s Causing So Many Young Adults to Die From Colorectal Cancer?

Over the past few months, the topic of colorectal cancer has received more public attention than ever before due to recent research from the American Cancer Society that shows colorectal cancer rates are rising among American millennials. It’s been a point of emphasis to discover what is causing this increase, but so far the answer has been inconclusive. One interesting trend the researchers found was that the mortality rate increase was primarily effecting Caucasian individuals while decreasing in African-American individuals. Self magazine recently interviewed Dr. Anton Bilchik, M.D., PhD, FACS – professor of surgery and chief of gastrointestinal research at John Wayne Cancer Institute at Providence Saint John’s Health Center – why this was occurring and his response was,

“One possible factor could be diet… it’s “possible” that whites eat more processed food, meat, or smoked foods, which have been linked to higher rates of colon cancer, but again, no one really knows.”

If you are interested in reading additional comments by Dr. Anton Bilchik from the interview with Self magazine, please visit:

https://www.self.com/story/colorectal-cancer-deaths