The major causes of cancer you should know
45The word cancer or malignant neoplasm as it medically known is so wide, there are different kinds of cancer and obviously different causes. People of every age can be effected with cancer though the risk increase with the increase in years. This means that older people are at a more risk of contacting cancer than the younger ones.
Abnormalities in the genetic material of the transformed cells are the major causes of In many cases, the abnormalities may be due to the effects of carcinogens, such as tobacco smoke, radiation, chemicals, or infectious agents.
However, you should not forget that other cancer-promoting genetic abnormalities may randomly occur through errors in DNA replication, or are inherited, and thus present in all cells from birth. The heritability of cancers is usually affected by complex interactions between carcinogens and the host's genome.
As I mentioned at the beginning, cancer is a very diverse decease and therefore its causes are so diverse, cancer, does not occur in a day, but they grow gradually as errors arise in the cancerous cells.
Known causes of cancer
Tobacco
There is proven evidence that tobacco causes cancer in the lung, head, neck, stomach, bladder, kidney, pancreas and larynx. Tobacco smoke contains over fifty known carcinogens, including nitrosamines and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. It is also the major source of cancer in developing countries where 1 in 3 of cancer patients associate it to tobacco
Ionizing radiation
This is also another source of cancer, some sources of ionizing radiation include radon gas. Over exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun can also lead to melanoma and other skin malignancies. Studies are also being done on the non ionizing radiation like those from mobile phones but evidence has not yet been established.
Viral or bacterial infection
Viruses are responsible for 15% of human cancers worldwide. The main viruses associated with human cancers are human papillomavirus, hepatitis B and hepatitis C virus, Epstein-Barr virus, and human T-lymphotropic virus. However, research in cancer has made a break through on the cancers mainly caused by viruses and some vaccine tests to prevent theses kinds of cancers have been successful.
Hormonal imbalances
This is also another good cause of cancer. Some hormones can act in a similar manner to non-mutagenic carcinogens in that they may stimulate excessive cell growth
Heredity factors
Though most of the cancers have no connections to hereditary causes, there are some cases where this factor has contributed to cancer development. Example of these include; Li-Fraumeni syndrome, hereditary nonpolyposis colorectal cancer and Retinoblastoma,
