These chronic diseases—the diseases that ultimately kill us in modern Western societies—tend to cluster together in both populations and individual patients. Diabetes, heart disease, cancer, stroke, and Alzheimer’s account for five of the top ten causes of death in the U.S. A conservative estimate is that they cost the medical system and our society, in lost work and productivity, one trillion dollars a year. Together they’re often referred to as diseases of Western lifestyles, or diseases of Westernization. This cluster has led cancer researchers to suggest that obesity is a cause of cancer.
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