Toujour Pur

BOSTON - Obesity is on its way to being deadlier than smoking as a cause of cancer, a leading researcher said Friday. Being obese is currently associated with about 14 percent of cancer deaths in men and 20 percent in women, compared with about 30 percent each for smoking, Dr. Walter C. Willett of the Harvard School of Public Health, told the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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"As smoking goes down and obesity goes up it won’t be long before obesity is the No. 1 cancer killer," Willett said at a symposium on cancer prevention.

Added Dr. Douglas R. Lowy of the National Cancer Institute: "Cancer prevention begins at home. … Not all of us always act in our own best interest."

Willett said research is producing increasing evidence associating obesity with a variety of cancers, including breast, colorectal, liver, pancreas and gallbladder. Alcohol is also associated with certain cancers, he said.

In the 1980s, researchers focused on the amount of fat people ate as a probable cause of cancer, but studies did not strongly support that. Later they turned to diets high in fruits and vegetables as a way to reduce cancer, but again, Willett said, they struggled to find convincing evidence in studies.

Now attention has turned to obesity, and more and more research is providing evidence that indict that as a cancer cause.

That does not mean people should stop eating fruit and vegetables and go to a high-fat diet, he quickly added. "We do see evidence of a benefit for heart disease, I think that’s pretty real," he said.

And, he noted, studies have indicated some benefit from a high fruit and vegetable diet in some cancers, he added, including mouth, esophagus, lung and stomach.

Overall, Willett estimated 30 percent to 35 percent of cancers are due to nutritional factors, much of it to obesity.

 

MEXICO CITY — Fidel Castro stepped down Tuesday morning as the president of Cuba after a long illness, ending one of the longest tenures as an all-powerful, communist head of state in the world, according to Granma, the official publication of the Cuban Communist Party.
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In late July 2006, Mr. Castro, who is 81, handed over power temporarily to his brother, Raúl Castro, 76, and a few younger cabinet ministers, after an acute infection in his colon forced him to undergo emergency surgery. Despite numerous surgeries, he has never fully recovered but has remained active in running government affairs from behind the scenes.

Now, just days before the national assembly is to meet to select a new head of state, Mr. Castro resigned permanently in a letter to the nation and signaled his willingness to let a younger generation assume power. He said his failing health made it impossible to return as president.

“I will not aspire to neither will I accept — I repeat I will not aspire to neither will I accept — the position of President of the Council of State and Commander in chief,” he wrote.

He added: “It would betray my conscience to occupy a responsibility that requires mobility and the total commitment that I am not in the physical condition to offer.”

The announcement put Raúl Castro in position to be anointed as the Cuban head of state when the National Assembly meets on Sunday, cementing the power structure that has run the country since Mr. Castro fell ill.

But Mr. Castro’s unexpected announcement left it unclear what role other high-level government ministers — among them the vice president, Carlos Lage Davila, and the foreign minister, Felipe Perez Roque — would play in the new government.

Mr. Castro also made it clear he is not fading into the sunset but pledged to continue to be a force in Cuban politics through his writings, just as he has over the last year and a half. “I am not saying goodbye to you,” he wrote. “I only wish to fight as a soldier of ideas.”

That statement raised the possibility little would change after Sunday’s vote, that Cuba will continue to be ruled in essence by two presidents, with Raúl Castro on stage while Fidel Castro lurks in the wings. At times over the last year and a half, the current government has seemed paralyzed when the two men disagree.