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Comment by MartinMond | Hacker News Reader

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MartinMond·

Can someone explain how lack of fruit and vegetables leads to cancer?

I can understand it leading to colon cancer, but does it also lead to other kinds of cancer?

AFAIK even if you never eat fruits/vegetables you aren't lacking any micronutrients?

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I'm not sure if a lack of fruits and veggies leads to cancer. It leads to malnutrition. But, fruits and veggies have many benefits to prevent cancer: fiber helps your poo move through your bowels better; antioxidents fight free radicals; vitamins in natural form do lots of cool things (metabolism, brain function, etc.) that help your body's cells replicate normally.

I supposed you could argue for multivitamins. My approach is to not bet against 6000+ years of human biochemistry.

I don't think the study makes that claim. They are claiming that 6% of men with cancer don't eat enough fruits and vegetables (i'm not sure what enough is). There is no way to infer whether or not the lack of fruits and vegetables was the root cause of cancer in those cases.

Given that it's specific to men, I'd say fiber and prostate cancer. There's some evidence, specifically with respect to cancer, (I don't know if it's strong or not), that it helps clean out toxins and it helps regulate hormones.

There are more complex things at play here. Some foods actually contain compounds that reduce or prevent tumor growth. Cabbage for example has highest levels of two anti-cancer glucosinolates and protects against breast cancer and bread crust; has highest levels of Interlukin-B which protects against colon cancer.

As a real world example; Polish women have the lowest incidence of breast cancer and the highest consumption of cabbage.

Fruits and vegetables contain antioxidants.

Antioxidants may not do anything to prevent cancer.

(http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2009/10/02/antioxida...)

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