The World Health Organisation (WHO) announced earlier
that processed meats were carcinogenic, expanding the ever-increasing list of
what can cause cancer.
Now, the International Agency for
Research on Cancer (IARC), an organisation that collects and studies
data on the disease, has released an exhaustive list of the 116 items,
activities and chemicals that can contribute to cancer.
Although
red meat is not on the list – it is only “probable” that the meat causes cancer
– other activities to steer clear of include cabinet making (excessive exposure
to wood dust has been linked to nasal cancer) and Chinese-style salted fish.
According
to the IARC “Contraceptives, oral, sequential forms of hormonal contraception”
can also contribute to contracting the disease.
Cancer is
one of the leading causes of death globally. An estimated 8.2 million people
died of cancer-related diseases in 2012 with the number of deaths expected to
rise by around 70 per cent over the next two years, according to data from WHO
released earlier this year.
Smoking
remains the number one cause of cancer, contributing to roughly 20 per cent of
global cancer deaths and around 70 per cent of global lung cancer deaths.
Here is
the full list:
- Tobacco smoking
- Sunlamps and sunbeds
- Aluminium production
- Arsenic in drinking water
- Auramine production
- Boot and shoe manufacture and repair
- Chimney sweeping
- Coal gasification
- Coal tar distillation
- Coke (fuel) production
- Furniture and cabinet making
- Haematite mining (underground) with exposure to radon
- Secondhand smoke
- Iron and steel founding
- Isopropanol manufacture (strong-acid process)
- Magenta dye manufacturing
- Occupational exposure as a painter
- Paving and roofing with coal-tar pitch
- Rubber industry
- Occupational exposure of strong inorganic acid mists containing sulphuric acid
- Naturally occurring mixtures of aflatoxins (produced by funghi)
- Alcoholic beverages
- Areca nut - often chewed with betel leaf
- Betel quid without tobacco
- Betel quid with tobacco
- Coal tar pitches
- Coal tars
- Indoor emissions from household combustion of coal
- Diesel exhaust
- Mineral oils, untreated and mildly treated
- Phenacetin, a pain and fever reducing drug
- Plants containing aristolochic acid (used in Chinese herbal medicine)
- Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) - widely used in electrical equipment in the past, banned in many countries in the 1970s
- Chinese-style salted fish
- Shale oils
- Soots
- Smokeless tobacco products
- Wood dust
- Processed meat
- Acetaldehyde
- 4-Aminobiphenyl
- Aristolochic acids and plants containing them
- Asbestos
- Arsenic and arsenic compounds
- Azathioprine
- Benzene
- Benzidine
- Benzo[a]pyrene
- Beryllium and beryllium compounds
- Chlornapazine (N,N-Bis(2-chloroethyl)-2-naphthylamine)
- Bis(chloromethyl)ether
- Chloromethyl methyl ether
- 1,3-Butadiene
- 1,4-Butanediol dimethanesulfonate (Busulphan, Myleran)
- Cadmium and cadmium compounds
- Chlorambucil
- Methyl-CCNU (1-(2-Chloroethyl)-3-(4-methylcyclohexyl)-1-nitrosourea; Semustine)
- Chromium(VI) compounds
- Ciclosporin
- Contraceptives, hormonal, combined forms (those containing both oestrogen and a progestogen)
- Contraceptives, oral, sequential forms of hormonal contraception (a period of oestrogen-only followed by a period of both oestrogen and a progestogen)
- Cyclophosphamide
- Diethylstilboestrol
- Dyes metabolized to benzidine
- Epstein-Barr virus
- Oestrogens, nonsteroidal
- Oestrogens, steroidal
- Oestrogen therapy, postmenopausal
- Ethanol in alcoholic beverages
- Erionite
- Ethylene oxide
- Etoposide alone and in combination with cisplatin and bleomycin
- Formaldehyde
- Gallium arsenide
- Helicobacter pylori (infection with)
- Hepatitis B virus (chronic infection with)
- Hepatitis C virus (chronic infection with)
- Herbal remedies containing plant species of the genus Aristolochia
- Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (infection with)
- Human papillomavirus type 16, 18, 31, 33, 35, 39, 45, 51, 52, 56, 58, 59 and 66
- Human T-cell lymphotropic virus type-I
- Melphalan
- Methoxsalen (8-Methoxypsoralen) plus ultraviolet A-radiation
- 4,4’-methylene-bis(2-chloroaniline) (MOCA)
- MOPP and other combined chemotherapy including alkylating agents
- Mustard gas (sulphur mustard)
- 2-Naphthylamine
- Neutron radiation
- Nickel compounds
- 4-(N-Nitrosomethylamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone (NNK)
- N-Nitrosonornicotine (NNN)
- Opisthorchis viverrini (infection with)
- Outdoor air pollution
- Particulate matter in outdoor air pollution
- Phosphorus-32, as phosphate
- Plutonium-239 and its decay products (may contain plutonium-240 and other isotopes), as aerosols
- Radioiodines, short-lived isotopes, including iodine-131, from atomic reactor accidents and nuclear weapons detonation (exposure during childhood)
- Radionuclides, α-particle-emitting, internally deposited
- Radionuclides, β-particle-emitting, internally deposited
- Radium-224 and its decay products
- Radium-226 and its decay products
- Radium-228 and its decay products
- Radon-222 and its decay products
- Schistosoma haematobium (infection with)
- Silica, crystalline (inhaled in the form of quartz or cristobalite from occupational sources)
- Solar radiation
- Talc containing asbestiform fibres
- Tamoxifen
- 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-para-dioxin
- Thiotepa (1,1’,1”-phosphinothioylidynetrisaziridine)
- Thorium-232 and its decay products, administered intravenously as a colloidal dispersion of thorium-232 dioxide
- Treosulfan
- Ortho-toluidine
- Vinyl chloride
- Ultraviolet radiation
- X-radiation and gamma radiation
Culled from: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/116-things-that-cause-cancer-a6712931.html
