Popcorn addicts risk lethal lung condition, doctors warn

[Ebtisweetsam]

Cancer is actually a very generic term. There are many different conditions classified as cancerous. Each with a different set of symptoms and causes.

Basicaly cancer is simply unregulated cell growth.

Many old diseases are now lumped together as cancer and had different names in the past.

Not very long ago causes of death were lumped into about 3 or for causes.

Heart Failure

Consumption

accidents

Poisoning


As pathology became more precise, specific names have been given for various causes of death. It does not seem to be any new diseaes or causes of death, just better methods of identifying them. Of course some of the conditions that can cause cancer, are now more prevelant, but they are not causing anything that has not existed in the past.

Overall people are living much longer and healthier(depends on how you define health) lives than they did 2000 years ago. Or even 100 years ago. Going by standards of 100 years ago, I am considered ancient. By todays standards and longevity statistics I am more considered early old age. Paradoxically life of today is both better and worse than it was 100 years ago.

I dont want to go too off topic, but are you saying people are living longer? Dont statistics saying people are dying earlier?
Also are you saying that cancer was considered the name of most diseases, but now they have their own names (like heart failure, poisoning etc)?

 

[Woodrow]

I dont want to go too off topic, but are you saying people are living longer? Dont statistics saying people are dying earlier?
Also are you saying that cancer was considered the name of most diseases, but now they have their own names (like heart failure, poisoning etc)?

In the past there were only a small handfull of names for diseases. Medicine has become more precise in naming things. for example when I was young if the cause of death was unknown, it was simply called heart failure.

People are living much longer than they have in the past 2,000 years. however, it is recorded in the Qur'an that in the far past people had very long lives and by those standards life today is much shorter. But, going back into recent history. Up to 2,000 years ago each generation has lived longer than the previous generation.

After remaining fairly constant for most of human history, life
expectancy (the average number of years a person can expect
to live) has nearly doubled in the past century. The maximum
life span—the longest number of years a human being has
lived—has increased spectacularly as well. There is little dis-
agreement over these facts. Scholarly opinion diverges, howev-
er, as to whether these increases will continue or whether
human longevity is approaching its limit

Source: http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:kom-0VYIjvUJ:www.prb.org/pdf06/NIA_FutureofLifeExpectancy.pdf+Life+expectancy+increases+past+today+compared+to+past&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&gl=us

What this all has to do with the original topic, is that while more health risks are being identifies, they are being corrected, resulting in longer lives.

Todays generation has a life expectancy twice that of people born in 1907 and at any time during the 2,000 years prior to that. No magic life extending medicine. Just better identification of causes of needless death and removing them.

The next major health risk that needs to be solved is war.