It turns out that wealth doesn't necessarily buy health after all.
A large new study from Finland suggests that people with good jobs have a higher genetic risk of cancer, especially breast and prostate cancer, casting doubt on the long-held belief that poor people have higher cancer rates.
The study assessed the risk of 19 diseases using genetic, health and socioeconomic (defined as education and occupation, not income) information from 280,000 adults over the age of 35. The researchers collected data from the Finnish Genome Project, which analyzed biobank and national registry records.
The study found that less educated people have a higher genetic predisposition to developing rheumatoid arthritis, lung cancer, depression, alcoholism and type 2 diabetes, while more educated people have a higher risk of breast and prostate cancer.
The study was presented last month at the European Society of Human Genetics' annual conference.
What's unique about this analysis is that it focuses not only on lifestyle and environmental factors, but also on genetics.
Researchers have previously noted that low-income people bear the unequal burden of cancer because they are more likely to be uninsured and have limited access to prevention, screening and treatment services.
Dr Fiona Hagenbeek said her research highlights a link between socioeconomic status, genetics and cancer incidence, but had not carried out formal research.
She hypothesized to The Washington Post that people with wealth have better access to health care, including testing, are more likely to have higher health literacy, and are less likely to engage in risky behaviors like smoking and alcohol abuse. Age is also a factor.
“The higher cancer rates among people of higher socioeconomic status may reflect that these people are not dying from other causes at a younger age and are reaching an age where they develop cancer,” Hagenbeek told The Washington Post in an email on Friday.
Meanwhile, Dr. Jiyong Ahn, professor of population sciences and vice director of the Perlmutter Cancer Center at New York University Grossman School of Medicine, believes screening behaviors are key to the study.
“It's well-known that the higher your socioeconomic status, the more likely you are to get tested,” Ang told The Washington Post.
Elisa Port, MD, chief of breast surgery at the Mount Sinai Health System, was also interested to learn how participants were screened.
“Breasts and prostate [of cancer] “The more we screen, the more we look, the more we find,” Port told The Post.
The American Cancer Society projects that more than 310,000 women in the United States will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer this year, and there will be about 300,000 new cases of prostate cancer.
A new ACS study finds that many cancer cases, including tens of thousands of breast cancer cases each year, are likely preventable through lifestyle changes.
Although women cannot change their genetics, family history, or the age at which they start menstruating or reach menopause, there are steps they can take to lower their risk of breast cancer.
Port recommends maintaining a healthy weight and limiting alcohol consumption — abstinence is best — and points out that women taking hormone replacement therapy during menopause also have a slightly increased risk.
Testing can help find cancer at an early stage when it's easier to treat. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends that men ages 55 to 69 be screened for prostate cancer with a prostate-specific antigen blood test.
The USPSTF recommends that women ages 40 to 74 who are at average risk for breast cancer get mammograms every two years, but some experts recommend annual screening to increase the chances of early detection.
In a statement accompanying the study, Hagenbeek suggested that women with higher genetic risk and higher education should be screened for breast cancer earlier or more frequently than women with lower genetic risk or lower education.
Meanwhile, An said, “It will be very interesting to see whether these findings can be replicated in the United States.”
