Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of obesity on cancer.

There is evidence that adults living with obesity have a higher risk of developing several types of cancer, according to research from Cancer Research UK, which is available at the following link:

https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/about-cancer/causes-of-cancer/obesity-weight-and-cancer/how-does-obesity-cause-cancer

Adults living with obesity are at a higher risk of many cancer types. This increased risk arises from excess weight causing mechanical changes to our bodies and complex changes to our hormones and metabolism. More information is available at the following links:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41416-018-0029-6

https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMsr1606602?url_ver=Z39.88-2003&rfr_id=ori:rid:crossref.org&rfr_dat=cr_pub%3dwww.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Data suggests that 6% of cancer cases in the United Kingdom are attributable to obesity and overweight, including: 34% of uterine cancer cases, or 3,000 out of 9,000; 24% of kidney cancer cases, or 2,900 out of 12,400; 17% of upper gastrointestinal cancer cases, or 5,600 out of 32,400; 11% of colorectal cancer cases​, or 4,800 out of 41,800; and 8% of breast cancer cases, or 4,600 out of 55,100. More information is available at the following link:

https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/health-professional/cancer-statistics/risk/overweight-and-obesity#heading-Zero