The Doctor's Diet: Dr. Travis Stork's STAT Program to Help You Lose Weight & Restore Your Health (53 page)

And here’s another reason to feel great: losing weight can lower your risk of a disease that we all fear. Stay tuned and I’ll tell you more about that.

The statistics truly are staggering. In 2013, doctors diagnosed 1.6 million new cases of cancer, and 580,350 Americans died from the disease. And here’s the part that really hurts: one-quarter to one-third of those cancers were caused by poor nutrition, physical inactivity, and excess weight. That’s right. Nearly 200,000 of those deaths could have been prevented—not by miracle drugs or amazing cures, but by the very same lifestyle choices that you’re making as part of The Doctor’s Diet.

Cancer is a complicated disease—in fact, there are actually hundreds of diseases that fit under the wide label of “cancer.” It’s really only recently that researchers have started to tease out the connections between diet, weight, and cancer. But despite the fact that there are still so many unanswered questions, one fact stands out: excess weight fuels cancer risk.

How sure are we of this? Let me share with you a quote on the topic that jumped out at me when I first read it. Scientific researchers are not big on absolutes—they’re much more likely to err on the side of caution and say certain things “might” cause disease rather than saying they “do” cause disease. But when it comes to weight and cancer, there’s no beating around the bush by W. Philip T. James, MD, a member of the panel of World Cancer Research Fund experts who analyzed 7,000 studies of weight and cancer:

“The message is absolutely clear as a bell: the relation of cancer to
obesity is so robust, it is going to rank close to the smoking problem in America pretty soon.”

OK, so we’ve established that excess weight boosts cancer risk. Now let’s talk about why that connection exists—and how following The Doctor’s Diet may lower your chances of getting it.