A new study has found that young people who don't smoke but eat very healthy diets rich in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains might have a higher risk of lung cancer.
To reach this conclusion, researchers studied 187 people who were diagnosed with lung cancer before age 50. They collected details about their lifestyle, including diet and smoking habits. Most of these people had never smoked and had a type of lung cancer that is different from the kind caused by smoking.
The researchers used a scoring system called the Healthy Eating Index to measure how healthy their diets were. On average, these patients had better diets than the general population, eating more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.
However, the findings suggested that younger non-smokers who follow very healthy diets may still face a higher risk of lung cancer. One possible reason could be pesticide exposure. Foods like fruits, vegetables, and grains, especially non-organic ones, can contain more pesticide residues. Scientists noted that people who work with pesticides often have higher lung cancer rates, which supports this idea.
"Our research shows that younger non-smokers who eat a higher quantity of healthy foods than the general population are more likely to develop lung cancer," said lead author Jorge Nieva, a medical oncologist and lung cancer specialist with USC Norris. "These counterintuitive findings raise important questions about an unknown environmental risk factor for lung cancer related to otherwise beneficial food that needs to be addressed."
The study also found that young women who don't smoke are diagnosed with lung cancer more often than men, and they tend to eat even more fruits and vegetables.
However, the researchers emphasized that this is not proven yet as they did not directly measure pesticide levels in the patients. Future research will test this by checking pesticide levels in blood or urine to better understand the risk.
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