“Disease? Only If There Was Processed Food 2 Million Years Ago,” By Hank Campbell. While cancer mortality has plummeted in recent years, survival rates have doubled in the last 40. Yet actual cancer rates have not really fallen overall, and there has long been a subset of people who claim that is because of our “modern” lifestyle; things like food and trace chemicals in the environment. Their solution is to be as ancient as possible; eat what they call a “paleo” diet and try to avoid chemicals that are not natural. That’s environmental science. Real science knows that the biggest risk for cancer, as it is with just about every disease, is age. The longer we live, the greater the chances that we will have a mutation or fault in our genes that will manifest in cancer. One hundred years ago, there was less cancer because the average life expectancy was only 42. Read more.