Most cancer down to lifestyle choices, not ‘bad luck’

A leading cancer research organisation has hit out at a recent study which attributes cancer to ‘bad luck’.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) said it “strongly disagrees” with the conclusion of the report on the causes of human cancer published earlier this month in the journal Science.

The research, which received widespread media coverage at the time, compared the number of lifetime stem cell divisions with lifetime cancer risks and suggested that random mutations, or bad luck, are “the major contributors to cancer overall, often more important than either hereditary or external environmental factors”.