Imagine inviting 12 friends to a dinner party—six men and six women. Look around the room and consider this: sometime in the future, two of the women and three of the men will develop cancer. Depressing as it seems, those are the odds we all must face, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS). Doctors diagnosed 1.3 million people with cancer in 2004, ACS statistics show, and about half of those patients did not survive. One piece of hopeful news comes from the National Cancer Institute, which argues that 80 percent of all cancers are linked to the environment (including diet and lifestyle choices like smoking). So if we can figure out what kinds of chemicals or behaviors are causing certain types of cancer, we can prevent them.
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