Obesity Might Promote Prostate Cancer for Asian and Hispanic Immigrants in North America

A new study, by Dan Mercola, MD, PhD, suggests that weight gain in Asian and Hispanic immigrants from the adoption of a North American diet can increase their chances of getting prostate cancer.

What impact does the Western fast-food culture have on Asian and Hispanic immigrants, and is that impact tied to increased rates of prostate cancer compared to nonimmigrant Asians and Hispanics?

“I hypothesized that the rise in prostate cancer among both of these immigrant populations is due to obesity and the inflammatory environment it creates,” says Dan Mercola, MD, PhD, a professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at UC Irvine.

Mercola conducted an extensive literature review to test his theory, pulling together several known facts in the epidemiology of cancer. He outlines his findings related to obesity-linked genes in a paper published in Frontiers in Public Health.

The Likely Culprit

“Known facts in the epidemiology of cancer include that immigrants to North America exhibit significantly increased prostate cancer compared to their stay-at-home cohorts,” says Mercola, “and that genes activated in obesity — especially in the surrounding fat of the prostate and other organs — impose an inflammatory environment leading to the initiation and aggressiveness of prostate cancer.”

Mercola also refers to recent studies showing that these immigrant populations undergo a significant increase in obesity. “In some reports, they exceed the obesity, or BMI, of the nonimmigrant population — a form of diet acculturation,” he says. Putting these together, Mercola developed his hypothesis.

“Historically, individual factors like red meat or saturated fat were thought to be related to the increased prostate cancer,” says Mercola, “but my review points out that it is likely the modern plague of North America — obesity — that is the culprit.”

Ethnic-Specific Biomarkers

According to recent research, mutations of genes in prostate cancer may vary by ethnicity. “For example, genes called FOXA1 and CHD1 are more commonly altered in African Americans and may become drug targets,” says Mercola. “Similarly, since epigenetic dysregulation — that is, biochemical modifications of the DNA or histones — differs by ancestry, these may yield ethnically tailored approaches,” says Mercola. “This opens new research avenues for developing ethnic-specific prognosis biomarkers and treatment options.”

In collaborative studies with Farah Rahmatpanah, PhD, an assistant professor in residence in UC Irvine’s Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Mercola has observed differences in inflammatory gene products in the environment of prostate cancer in African Americans compared to European Americans. The former often have more aggressive prostate cancer, further illustrating ethnic-specific gene expression in prostate cancer.

Mercola proposes examining tissue from treated cases of prostate cancer in obese and non-obese immigrants. “AI programs can read tissues and define hundreds of genes that are being expressed at the cellular level in the tumors and environment around the tumors,” says Mercola. He predicts that “the obesity profile” would be represented, along with reported ethnic-specific genes, in tumors of Hispanic and Asian prostate cancer, which may not be the case in cancer arising in slim individuals or in nonimmigrant cohorts.

Mercola further adds that the implications of this study extend beyond the burden of obesity and cancer in immigrants. “A major lesson for us all is that the environment we live in, and the risks and lifestyle of that environment, can profoundly impact our health.”