§ Mr. BaronTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what estimate he has made of the proportion of cancer cases which were preventable in the last year for which figures are available, broken down by type of cancer. [150232]
§ Miss Melanie Johnson[holding answer 26 January 2004]: There is no safe way to estimate the numbers of cancer cases that were preventable. Smoking, poor diet and lack of exercise all play their part in causing cancers but less controlable factors such as genetic make-up and environment make identifying preventable factors difficult.