ANY cancer diagnosis is a shock and a cause for concern especially if it’s an aggressive form of the disease.

However, some cancers can be predicted – and now are as new figures show that bad lifestyles are the cause of 2,500 cancer cases a week. Yes, that does read “a week”.

Cancer Research UK, a body which knows what it’s talking about, revealed that almost four in 10 cancers could be avoided by people making lifestyle improvements.

Of the 360,000 new cancer cases in 2015, 135,500 could have been avoided. For an idea of scale, that’s just under half the population of Bolton.

While some cancers are obviously caused by genes or bad luck, what these latest figures prove is that our health really does lie in our own hands. And that cancer is largely down to environmental factors, especially unhealthy lifestyles.

Switching to a healthier diet, doing more exercise and giving up smoking mean four in 10 cancer cases would not have happened. With the welcome news of falling smoking rates, our soaring levels of obesity mean it could overtake smoking as the top preventable cause of cancer in the next 20 years.

Harpal Kumar, chief executive of Cancer Research UK, said we are facing an obesity-led cancer time-bomb. “Obesity is potentially the new smoking”, he stated. “We need to turn that tide around and we need to act quickly.”

What all this means is that a reality check is overdue for most of us. The NHS is creaking with the literal weight of obesity-related health problems and we are increasingly accepting being very large as normal.

We actually know when our weight is not normal for our height and we are officially classed as obese but we prefer to argue with this and instead look for affirmation elsewhere.

Obesity affects one in every four adults and one in every five children aged 10 to 11. If we continue not to accept responsibility for our own individual health then the numbers of cancers will continue to rise alongside obesity levels for all ages and both sexes.

As well as putting ourselves into the frame for various cancers, being obese means we’re more likely to have type 2 diabetes and heart disease – both life-threatening.

As parents, we also have a duty to insure the future of our children by helping them live healthily and also by being positive role models.