Increase in Cancer Rates in People Under 50 Linked to “Accelerated Aging”

• by Amber Baker

• Published April 23, 2024
• Immune & Brain Disorders

+ Share This Article

Accelerated biological aging may be to blame for rising cancer rates in young people, new research from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri suggests. The new research, recently presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting in San Diego, California, shows an alarming increase in early-onset cancer, the term for cancer diagnoses in people under 50.¹

While scientists are not completely sure what is causing the spike in early-onset cancer diagnoses, the latest study suggests the uptick stems from a phenomenon called “accelerated aging,” where a person’s biological age is older than their chronological age.¹

The team of researchers evaluated the medical records of 148,724 people aged 37 to 54 using the U.K. Biobank database and honed in on nine blood-based markers that coincide with biological age: albumin, alkaline phosphatase, creatinine, C-reactive protein, glucose, mean corpuscular volume, red cell distribution width, white blood cell count, and lymphocyte proportion.²

Using an algorithm called PhenoAge, the team plugged in the nine values for each participant to compare their biological ages to their chronological ages. The team then cross-referenced cancer registries to identify how many in the group had early-onset cancer diagnoses (before age 55). Some 3,200 cancers were diagnosed.

Among the findings, lung cancer had the highest increase (42 percent), with uterine cancer (36 percent) and gastrointestinal cancer (22 percent) trailing closely behind. Researchers also found that people born after 1965 were 17 percent more likely to experience accelerated aging than those born before 1965.²

 Cancer Increasingly Common Among Younger Adults

The risk of cancer increases exponentially as we age, with the median age of a cancer diagnosis being 66 years. However, a growing body of research suggests cancer is no longer only a concern for the elderly. ⁴“Multiple cancer types are becoming increasingly common among younger adults in the United States and globally,” said Ruiyi Tian, MPH, a graduate student at Washington University School of Medicine and one of the study researchers, said in an interview.

Historically, both cancer and aging have been viewed primarily as concerns for older populations. The realization that cancer, and now aging, are becoming significant issues for younger demographics over the past decades was unexpected.³

Tian added, “The principal findings highlight that accelerated aging is increasingly prevalent among successive birth cohorts, potentially serving as a crucial risk factor or mediator for various environmental and lifestyle-related risk factors leading to early-onset cancer.”⁴

“Just because a person is 40 years old chronologically does not mean that they are 40 years old biochemically,” Brett Osborn, MD, a Florida neurologist and longevity expert who was not involved in the new research, said in an interview.  “In other words, there may be a difference in one’s age—meaning, how long they’ve stood on this earth—and the body’s inner biochemical health, or lack thereof.” Osborn focuses on his patients’ biological age to help mitigate the risk of age-related diseases⁴

Multiple Types of Cancer on the Rise Globally

While the latest study that links early-onset cancers to accelerated aging only involved participants in the United Kingdom, another recent study reported that 29 cancers have increased by a staggering 79 percent globally between 1990 and 2019, with early-onset cancer deaths rising by approximately 28 percent during the same timeframe. The study cites that “living a healthier lifestyle” can reduce incidences of early-onset cancer. A recently released Cancer Statistics report stated that cervical and colorectal cancer have increased in both younger males and females.⁵

The research team aims to uncover the mechanisms driving accelerated aging and early-onset cancers to develop precision cancer prevention strategies, the American Association for Cancer Research said in an Apr. 7 press release. “The hope is that these findings will lead to interventions to slow biological aging as a “new avenue for cancer prevention,” the researchers noted. “It is vital for recent generations to become more health-conscious and consider the implications of accelerated aging,” Tian said.^{4 6}

For the first time, the number of new cancer cases in the U.S. are expected to surpass two million in 2024—an unprecedented number in the country.⁷

---

If you would like to receive an e-mail notice of the most recent articles published in The Vaccine Reaction each week, click here.

Click here to view References