It is time to celebrate researchers' amazing identification of our the body's big secret—liver cells! These silent miraculous unrecognized liver cells have been hiding inside our noncomplaining, liver.
The liver cells that protect us and keep our bodies functioning 24/7, 365 days a year.
This amazing, unrecognized organ has provided us with the sorely needed rationale for eating less sugar, fats and carbohydrates that tragically underlie the development of 13 types of preventable obesity related cancers.
Preventive liver information is sorely needed to motivate individuals to protect their precious liver cells from being damaged by hepatitis viruses, alcohol and drug abuse and overeating unhealthy foods that underlie the development of cirrhosis and any one of the 13 obesity-related cancers. Hepatitis viruses damage liver cells that create energy stored as sugar (called glycogen) in fat cells in the liver.
What You Need to Know
The liver, an often unrecognized organ, plays a vital role in protecting the body and keeping it functioning.
Many liver-related diseases, including obesity-related cancers, hepatitis, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases, are preventable. By avoiding excessive sugar, fats, and carbohydrates, individuals can reduce their risk of liver damage caused by factors like overeating, drug and alcohol abuse, and viral infections such as hepatitis.
There is an urgent need to promote liver health education as part of the national health agenda.
Overcrowding of the liver with excess fat cells that contain the unused energy, unrecognized, smothers healthy liver cells plus "cancer fighting liver cells, unknowingly created by overeating sugar laden and fatty foods, not using the energy stored in fat cells and by avoiding regular exercise. This eventually underlies the development of fatty liver diseases, obesity, cirrhosis and many types of cancer.
Promoting understandable liver information, glaringly absent from our national health agenda for decades, is essential to saving lives by empowering millions of uninformed individuals with unreported or unrecognized liver diseases that are preventable. These preventable liver related diseases include; obesity and 13 obesity-related types of cancer, hepatitis, type 2 diabetes, NASH, cardiovascular diseases and especially alcohol and drug abuse.
Obesity is a chronic disease that can increase the risk of other chronic diseases, including cancer.1 The CDC’s latest data2 shows 40.3% of US adults are obese, with severe obesity affecting 9.7% of adults. A JAMA study3 found that children and adults in low-income and low-food access neighborhoods face an increased risk of obesity, highlighting the need for targeted interventions.
Hepatitis viruses are a leading cause of liver disease and disfunction. Often called the silent killer, hepatitis C, is one of the hepatitis viruses that can be asymptomatic.
It is time for Congress to require life-saving liver education as part of the national health agenda. You and your precious children need to be informed about the importance of their life supporting liver to motivate them to protect it and avoid the temptation to experiment with drugs, alcohol and unhealthy food and lifestyle behaviors.
References
1.Bodelon C, Sung H, Mitchell EL, et al. Excess Body Weight and the Risk of Second Primary Cancers Among Cancer Survivors. JAMA Netw Open. 2024;7(9):e2433132. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.33132
2.Emmerich SD, Fryar CD, Stierman B, Ogden CL. Obesity and severe obesity prevalence in adults: United States, August 2021–August 2023. NCHS Data Brief, no 508. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2024. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.15620/cdc/159281
3.Aris IM, Wu AJ, Lin PD, et al. Neighborhood Food Access in Early Life and Trajectories of Child Body Mass Index and Obesity. JAMA Pediatr. Published online September 16, 2024. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2024.3459
