Obese people are more likely to get cancer as their fat clogs up the immune system, scientists say
- Obese people have a higher chance of getting preventable tumours, study finds
- Scientists are starting to understand how weight gain raises cancer chances
- A new study led by Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the US found too much fat damages tumour killing cells
Obese people are more likely to get cancer because fat clogs up the immune system, scientists have discovered.
Obesity is the second biggest preventable cause of cancer in Britain, and scientists are starting to understand how weight gain gives it a helping hand.
A study led by Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the US found that too much fat in the body damages the ‘natural killer’ cells we need to destroy tumours.
Scientists have discovered that obese people are more likely to get cancer because fat clogs up the immune system [File photo]
The cells are the body’s foot soldiers for fighting cancer.
However, they can get clogged up by fatty acids which escape from love handles and beer bellies.
While they can still latch on to cancer cells, they kill them much more slowly or not at all.
Obesity is the second biggest preventable cause of cancer in Britain, and scientists are starting to understand how weight gain increases it [File photo]
Study co-author Professor Lydia Lynch, an associate professor in immunology at Trinity College Dublin, said: ‘When people are obese it disrupts the killing machinery in their natural killer cells so that they are metabolically paralysed.’
One in 20 cases of cancer in Britain is linked to obesity.
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