Internet
Penetration: A New Explainable and Highly Accurate Predictor of
Worldwide Cancer Incidence by
Dr Chris Barnes, Bangor Scientific and
Educational Consultants, Gwynedd, Wales.
E-mail manager@bsec-wales.co.uk April 2015
Abstract
Rising world cancer incidence is
discussed. No one factor has ever been
able to be found which correlates so well with all cancer incidence that it can
be used in highly predictive manner.
However, logical reasoning of the present author suggest that factor known as ‘Percentage Internet
Penetration’ ought to be a good correlating factor for cancer incidence. The
logic to this is as follows. Internet
Penetration should be expected to be
a measure of a country’s affluence. More
affluent countries ought to have more ageing and therefore more cancer. More affluent countries tend to produce
more light at night and with internet comes more RF radiation, light from
monitor screens and household lights after dark rather akin to television,
therefore also more cancer. With internet penetration more physical inactivity
is to be expected, more tendencies to
stay indoors and suffer reduced vitamin
D status hence also more cancer. More affluent countries have populations which
have a tendency to consume more junk/processed food, therefore also more
cancer. All these separate, yet
seemingly unquantifiable, effects will, although having greater or lesser
extents on individual cancer
types, be convoluted together in the
overall regression Cancer Incidence , Ordinate,
versus Internet Penetration,
abscissa. It is to be expected therefore
by way of this hypothesis that the more cancer types included the greater will
be the regression factor. Not only is
the hypothesis validated, in that
Percentage of Internet Penetration is shown to be a highly accurate predictor of cancer incidence worldwide but
further it has been possible to explore some aspects of cancer aetiology namely
alcohol and vitamin D status by exploring
the cancer status of the zero alcohol
consuming Saudi Arabian people.
Introduction
Cancer incidence rates
have been rising throughout the world for several decades. No adequate
explanation has been offered for this. A
number of individual explanations have been offered, some of which concern factors which
correlate quite well with individual cancer types. For example, ageing has been shown to
correlate with hormonal cancers in
Britain and with Bowel cancer worldwide, see for example but not exclusively, Peto (2001) [1] and Mohr and Feldman et al (2001) [2].
The present author has shown
that at least in Britain, the sum of the incidence rates of the two main hormonal cancers, namely; breast and
prostate cancer since 1947 correlates almost exactly with the number of TV
Licenses issued and believes that both light and RF radiation are factors [3].
Further in another study he has shown
by using GIS data for GSM cell
phone penetration, Night Light (wealth index) and Total Sunshine amounts that
each of them are convoluted functions in correlation with incidence statistics
for 10 common cancers on a global scale. He further emphasises the potency of
Radio Frequency emissions as a larger potential driver of cancer by melatonin
suppression then light, yet only the latter an acknowledged problem in many
quarters [4].
The present author has also
shown that at least in the USA, urban living is safer than country with regard
to cancer except for Breast, Prostate and Kidney cancer incidence. Many states in the USA still permit the use
of dangerous pesticides presently banned in the EU community.
Finally the present
author has also shown that contrary to popular belief sunshine does more good
than harm when it comes to cancer [5]. Malignant melanoma only seems to be a problem
in regions of the country and the world with a high radon concentration and low sunshine amounts in
spring and autumn.
Hypothesis
So what if there were to
be a technological factor which could be more predictive of all cancers
worldwide? Almost on a hunch, but with a
degree of logical reasoning the present author decided to test the factor know
as ‘Percentage Internet Penetration’ as a correlating factor for cancer
incidence. The logic to this is as follows.
Internet Penetration should be
expected to be a measure of a country’s affluence, see for example [6]Lucas and Sylla
(2003). Following the argument aboves, more affluent countries ought to have more ageing
and therefore more cancer. More
affluent countries tend to produce more light at night and with internet comes
more RF radiation, light from monitor screens and household lights after dark
rather akin to television, therefore also more cancer. With internet
penetration more physical inactivity is to be expected, more tendencies to stay indoors and suffer reduced vitamin D status hence through
these multiple factors also we would expect more cancer. Compelling evidence exists for the relationship
between physical inactivity and breast and bowel cancer [7]. Inactivity is
associated with TV viewing and internet use.
More affluent countries have populations which
have a tendency to consume more junk/processed food, therefore also more cancer,
see for example but not exclusively, Jakszyn et al (2006) [8].
More affluent countries tend to fill
their houses with furnishings made from modern materials leaking formaldehyde
and the like, therefore more cancer, see Bosetti et
al (2008) [9]. More affluent nations, with the exception of
affluent Islamic nations, will tend to consume more alcohol, therefore more
cancer, particularly in conjunction with smoking. For example, at least 75% of head and neck
cancers are attributable to a combination of cigarette smoking and alcohol
drinking, see Hashibe, P Brennan, S Benhamou… - … the National Cancer …, 2007 -
jnci.oxfordjournals.org [10].
All these separate, yet
seemingly almost unquantifiable, effects will although having greater or lesser
extents based on individual cancer
types, be nevertheless convoluted
together in the overall regression, with
Cancer Incidence as Ordinate,
versus Internet Penetration as
abscissa. It is thus also to be expected therefore by
way of this hypothesis that the more different cancer types (body sites) included
the greater will be the regression factor.
Data
Sets
Data on Internet
Penetration was taken from:
http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users-by-country/[11]
and data on world cancer incidence for twenty
countries was taken from CRC UK. The
nations used are ;Canada, USA, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, UK, France, Germany,
Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, China, Nigeria, South
Africa, Indonesia, Japan, Australia and India.
Results
and Discussion
Linear regressions were
plotted and calculated using CurveExpert by Hyams.
Figure 1 below shows a
plot of all cancers incidence versus Internet Penetration.
Figure
1
A highly linear
relationship is observed with a linear regression factor of .89. The two-tailed
P value is less than 0.0001 By
conventional criteria, this difference is considered to be extremely
statistically significant. The
implication is staggering. The suggestion is that almost 80% of cancers worldwide are associated with the factors discussed in the above
hypothesis.
It
is well worth mentioning that the largest outlier is the point at 52% Internet
Penetration which belongs to Saudi Arabia. Here cancer incidence is significantly lower
than predicted by the method. It is
expected that potentially the strict laws on alcohol consumption may possibly
account for some of the reduction in incidence and also at least in males a
good vitamin D status is to be expected due to geographic position. It is hoped to report and a more extensive
use of the method of using Internet Penetration correlation and specific
residuals (outliers) to explore much more detailed cancer aetiology in the very
near future.
It is instructive to
consider the regression between Internet Penetration and Ageing (Life
Expectancy), see Figure 2 below.
Figure
2.
The regression value is
.74. Therefore approximately 53% of the
above 80% of cancers worldwide in the age range 53-86.2 are found in aging,
i.e. 42%. This is in quite close agreement with the statistic
specified by CRC UK for aging in the UK.
The initial hypothesis
suggests that there should be no better correlation in this method than for all cancers combined. To test this and attempt has been made to
correlate three other common cancers with Internet Penetration. These are breast, prostate and bowel
cancers.
The result for breast
cancer is shown in Figure 3 below.
Figure
3 Internet Penetration as a predictor of
Breast Cancer R=.8
A similar correlation is
shown for Prostate Cancer in figure 4 below.
Figure
4 Internet Penetration as a predictor of
Breast Cancer R=.69
Figure
5 Internet Penetration as a predictor of
Breast Cancer R=.79
As
predicted no single cancer has a good a correlation with
internet penetration as with all cancers combined although nevertheless highly
significant correlation factors still exist with the above three named
cancers. This strongly supports the notion of convoluted functionality in
correlation and aetiology.
A final test of the
hypothesis can be applied that is to see if the regression factor for several
common cancers combined (but not all
known cancers) increases over that for single cancers above. A regression of total world incidence of
Lung, Prostate and Breast Cancer has been attempted against Internet
Penetration, see Figure 6 below.
Figure
6 Internet Penetration as a predictor
of totality of three common cancers R=.8
As expected, it is
observed that the regression factor R=.8 is higher than any of the single
cancers alone but less than for the
totality of all cancers combined r=.89.
Once again Saudi Arabia (
53% Internet Penetration) is the largest outlier with much lower rates of these
three cancers combined than would be predicted by the model. Zero alcohol consumption and good vitamin D
status particularly in males may account
for this.
This evidence is strongly
backed up by considering the comparative size of the Saudi outlier for the
three cancers Breast, Prostate and Bowel.
The rank in order of
lowest expected cancer probability ( largest negative outlier) with respect to the model is Prostate, Bowel, Breast.
This confirms the
importance of vitamin D status in these three cancers. The notion is as follows. Saudi males get far more exposure to sunlight
than Saudi females. As a result their Prostate cancer is far lower than
expected. The bowel outlier is central
because both males and females suffer from bowel cancer but only males will
have the Vitamin D advantage. The breast
outlier is so small as to be lost in the general scatter and indeed for breast cancer negative outliers from several other countries are comparable
to or even outlying the one for Saudi Arabia, reflective of the general poor
vitamin D status of the great majority
of Saudi women who will not receive much sunlight directly to skin because of
traditional/ religious dress code rules.
Conclusions
Percentage of Internet
Penetration has been shown to be a
highly accurate predictor of total cancer incidence
worldwide. Further it has been possible
to explore some aspects of cancer aetiology namely alcohol and vitamin D
status. Moreover, it is hoped to report more extensively on this and other
aetiologies by extending the present method in the very near future.
References
http://www.journalofinteractionscience.com/content/1/1/4
1. J Peto - Nature, 2001 - nature.com http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v411/n6835/abs/411390a0.html
2. http://www.goldjournal.net/article/S0090-4295%2800%2901116-X/abstract?cc=y=
3. C. Barnes http://drchrisbarnes.co.uk/TVCAN.htm
4. C.Barnes http://drchrisbarnes.co.uk/CAGIS.htm
5. C. Barnes http://www.drchrisbarnes.co.uk/SUNGOOD.htm
6. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0810902032000050983
7.
Vainio H, Bianchini F, editors. IARC
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11. http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users-by-country/
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