Presidential Advisory Panel Urges Comprehensive Approach To Reduce Cancer Risks Associated with Obesity and Tobacco
Shifting Emphasis from Disease Treatment to Prevention Could Save Nearly Two-thirds of Lives Lost to Cancer

ATLANTA ­ To reduce lifestyle-related cancers, the President's Cancer Panel is calling for more effective policy, community programs, and healthier behavior choices, as described in its annual report to the President, released today at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Cancer Conference.

The Panel's report cites the accelerating increase in obesity among adults and children, the mounting evidence linking obesity to higher risk for numerous cancers, and the lack of recent progress in reducing tobacco use and secondhand smoke exposure. Cancer and other disease-related morbidity, mortality, health care costs, and productivity losses associated with unhealthy lifestyle behaviors are escalating at an alarming rate.

"If we as a society want to see a significant drop in the number of lives lost to cancer, it is up to each of us to make it happen," said Dr. LaSalle D. Leffall, Jr., chairman of the Panel. "It will require elected officials and policymakers to change policies that are not promoting healthy lifestyles; a coordinated health care community that supports education and prevention messages for cancer and other diseases; media, city planners, and educators – those outside the traditional cancer research and health care delivery realms – to recognize their role in fostering healthy lifestyles; and individuals to assume personal responsibility for practicing healthy habits."

The Panel highlights several strategies that are needed to protect the public health: create the political will; significantly change the culture; coordinate more unified efforts among disease-focused public and non-governmental agencies; and shift the health care emphases toward disease prevention.

The Panel concludes that:

• Government and institutions have an obligation to protect the public health.
• The health care community must coordinate and integrate education and prevention messages related to obesity, diet and nutrition, physical activity, tobacco use, and environmental tobacco smoke exposure with educational efforts related to other diseases that have common risk factors in order to leverage available resources and simplify and harmonize risk reduction messages.
• Individuals, to the best of their ability, must seek out information about the risks of poor diet, inactivity, tobacco use, and secondhand smoke exposure and make personal choices to protect their health and that of their families.

Select recommendations regarding obesity include:

• Adopt policies and provide funding to improve the built environment to encourage physical activity with walker-friendly communities and safe public spaces.
• Coordinate U.S. agricultural subsidy and public health policy for diet and nutrition to improve the food supply and help ensure access to affordable, healthy food. Structure farm supports to encourage more fruits and vegetables and less corn syrup, and restructure regulations for food choices allowed by the Women, Infants, and Children Program, Head Start, and school lunch programs.
• Regulate and monitor food advertising in media targeting children.

Select recommendations regarding tobacco include:

• Ratification and implementation of the international Framework Convention for Tobacco Control. Key provisions include comprehensive bans on tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship, and larger and stronger warning labels on products.
• Authorize – and sufficiently fund – the Food and Drug Administration to strictly regulate tobacco products and product marketing.
• Increase the Federal excise tax on tobacco products.
• Strengthen anti-tobacco efforts at the state and local levels.

The Panel also called for additional research to be conducted in the following areas of study:

• Behavior change in individuals and populations
• Health services research to evaluate workplace wellness programs and tobacco prevention and cessation interventions.
• Mechanisms of food addiction and possible parallels to tobacco and/or drug additions.

For the complete report, visit http://pcp.cancer.gov. Hardcopies may be ordered by writing to pcp-r@mail.nih.gov or President's Cancer Panel, 6116 Executive Boulevard, Suite 212, Rockville, MD 20892.

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