Do young people get lung cancer?

Question

I've never heard of a young person getting lung cancer, and when I search google they seem to define a young patient as in their thirties. Is it possible to get it in your twenties? I'm 24 and have been smoking for about 7 years. Time to stop, I know, I'm getting very scared...

Answer 1

An uneducated person wrote:
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"We are all born with cancer in our bodies"
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This is incorrect. We are all born with the ability to DEVELOP cancer. The best person to ask a question like this would be a physician, not on an online forum.

But I'll put my 2 cents in. We've made major strides in understanding genes and cancer in the past 20 years. We can now understand that genetics plays a major role in the development of this disease. Yes even if you do everything right, you can still get cancer because cancer is a genetic disease. Your ability to develop cancer depends on many factors including genetics and environment. Smoking simply increases the percentage risk of you developing cancer. A lot of people say that we don't know what causes cancer. This is also incorrect. Cancer is caused by mutated dna(de-oxyribonucleic acid), the instructions that tell the cell what to do. Its formed in a double helix structure with a backbone made of sugars and phosphate. Its made of of 4 nucleotides..adenine with guanine cyctosine with guanine in the nucleus of a cell. The mutated cell is caused when a mistake is made during mitosis(cellular division) The cause of this mistake is bad cellular copying of dna. Theres some luck involved here, because its all about propability of a mistake! it's all about PERCENTAGES!!! What affects these percentages is your genetics and your environment There is NOT one cancer gene..but many MANY complicated genes.(many we don't know about yet)
A gene codes for a protein...ie it makes a protein...which is the building block of life...different proteins strung together can make very interesting things...like humans! or a worm!
Normally when a cell makes a bad copy of itself...it either goes through apoptosis(cell suicide...the cell kills itself) or the immune system kills it. If the cell screws up and the immune system scews up...the cell can start rapidly dividing and turn into cancer. This is a very complicated thing to talk about quickly here, but basically many many things go on when a cell divides that can go wrong.

Now that we know what causes cancer(cells with bad dna not following there cellular instructions)... What will cause these genetic mutations to happen? Environmental factors play a role and so does genetics. Your entire dna(the little piece of chemical machinery that contains instructions for your entire body), is unique to you and is a product of your genetics of your parents and there parents.... This blueprint(dna) will determine how athletic you are, how tall you are, how long you will live, and your PERCENTAGE chance of developing cancer. Your percentage can be increased or decreased by your environment(also you can stunt your height my malnutrition...so you can easily understand how environmental AND genetic roles play a factor in everything. For example, smoking will increase this risk.

Ok now that the backround is complete, I will answer your question simply. Getting lung cancer at a young age like 24 is very rare and if you did get it, it would have to do more with how bad your genetics are and not with the smoking.
Oh and to complicate things even more...."Lung cancer" is actually 100s of different diseases! "Lung cancer" just means a type of cancer developing in the lung.

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"First, it can take up 30 years to be able to detect a cancer. That doesn't mean that you don't have it until it is discovered. It simply means that you had it for years and had no symptoms and no way to detect it because it was not big enough to detect or big enough problem to diagnose."
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Absolute crap. Thats like saying hiv and aids are the same thing. You can have mutated dormant cells that are in the body for 30 years, BUT until they mutate into CANCER. there NOT cancer. Lots of people have mutated cells that NEVER turn into cancer. Granted 98% of people with hiv will get aids...the percentage with mutated cells is WAY WAY LOWER!

An uneducated person wrote:
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"Second. Cancers are in everyone of use. We all have cancerous cell develop within our bodies every day. HEALTHY and RESPONSIVE are the key words here."
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More nonsense

An uneducated person wrote:
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"The only way to have a healthy and capable responsive immun system is to supply your body with all the right food stuffs in ample quantity. These days you can only get that through supplementation as they are not in our green harvested produce any longer and synthetics only work poorly at best for the most part, because they are not recognized by the body at the cellular level"
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THIS IS ABSOLUTE GARBAGE. Show a study showing an increase level of t-cells with somebody using supplements vs. somebody eating healty. What causes a 4 year old to get cancer, not taking supplements??lol...what garbage. Genetics is the major player. Look at michael jordan...you think he's better at basketball just because he trained harder? NO way...its his genetics, but training hard will help make him even better just like eating healthy will decrease the risk of cancer, but the major player is still genes. Stick to science and forget that unproven supplement...natural crap. There just ripping you off with that stuff. It's like protein powders...just get a blender and stick some egg whites in it!!

Answer 2

If fact yes young people well under thirty do get lung cancer.

2 things that you should know.

First, it can take up 30 years to be able to detect a cancer. That doesn't mean that you don't have it until it is discovered. It simply means that you had it for years and had no symptoms and no way to detect it because it was not big enough to detect or big enough problem to diagnose.

Second. Cancers are in everyone of use. We all have cancerous cell develop within our bodies every day. The thing that keep us healthy is a healthy and responsive immunee system. HEALTHY and RESPONSIVE are the key words here.

The only way to have a healthy and capable responsive immun system is to supply your body with all the right food stuffs in ample quantity. These days you can only get that through supplementation as they are not in our green harvested produce any longer and synthetics only work poorly at best for the most part, because they are not recognized by the body at the cellular level.

Yes quit smoking. that is a great start.

Take plant derived vitamins and minerals. Get some glyconutrients into your body to optimize your immune systems ability to recognize and destroy unhealthy tissue and organisms and start living a good life feeling good.

It has been siad I was uneducated and full of crap. Well red the proof and go get educated but don't dish things you have no understanding of. The life you may place in jepordy is not your own to play with.

[e-mail]

Answer 3

My friend whom was 23 when she found out she had lung cancer!! You don't have to be old and smoke to get lung cancer. She doesn't know why she got it. She had he left lung removed and seems to be healthy and doing pretty damn good! I didn't even think you can live with one lung. Yes you should quit smoking but second hand smoke is bad too so if you quit stay away from second hand smoke. Also you can get lung cancer and not even smoke.

Answer 4

My Oncologist says that everyone has cancer cells and sometimes they mutate and become a problem, I am assuming he knows what he is telling me. Generally, your body fights and kills these cells. Sometimes they mutate and then you are diagnosed with cancer. You can get lung cancer at almost any age but it is fairly rare before the age of thirty. I smoked but the cancer I had was not caused by smoking, that does not mean the same is true of everyone. You are right...it is time to stop. Good luck!

Answer 5

yes you can get lung cancer especially if you continue to smoke. Besides lung cancer you can get emphesema too. Do you really want to be one of those people walking around with an oxygen tank 24/7?

If you are from NYC, call 311 and tell them you want to quit smoking. They will help you by giving you the names of support groups to giving you free nicotine patch.

Answer 6

I can't say I know the answer to your question exactly, but smoking while you are young can cause lung cancer when you get older. So, yeah, stop now, because you are only going to make your later years miserable.

Answer 7

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These are symptoms of allergies or bronchitis, or sometimes pneumonia. Its not impossible to get lung cancer at your age, but it is nearly impossible for cancer to be caused by 8 months of smoking and within this time frame also advance to the point where symptoms would be noticeable.

Answer 8

Heyy. What's up? My name's Rachel, let me tell you a brief story about myself which I believe may be of some Help to you...

I am an Emphysema Survivor. I remember when I was diagnosed back in 2012, and they told me I had to quit otherwise I would not make it another 2 years. I told them, "If I'm going to die, I'd like to die Happy with a cigarette in my mouth". Stupid yes, but it's how I felt. I was stubborn, and did not believe that it could happen to me. I am only 32 years old, been smoking since I was 16... but the idea of Death at age 32 feels very foreign, almost surreal. However, when I began to notice a constant shortness of breath, and even coughing up blood- I decided something had to be done. I tried really hard to quit a couple of times, but could never resist the urges and temptation. Anyone who has ever tried quitting cold turkey, or by using one of those worthless patches/gums, will know what I'm talking about.

I went and saw a specialist, a physician who is reputed to be very successful in helping people quit. Among other practical advise, he referred me to a World-class Vapor E-Cig @ https://tryvaporcigs.im .. It is an electronic cigarette that heats "liquid nicotine" into a Safe water vapor which you inhale. No toxic smoke. I was told by my physician that this is something the tobacco industry does not want us to know about. It smells Clean, leaving behind no odor... and gives that relaxing "nicotine fix" we get from the regular, mundane cigarette. Being odorless, it can be smoked anywhere- even indoors. I have social anxiety, so a problem I do have with it is people always approaching me; telling me how cool it looks and asking a million questions when I'm seen Vaping in malls or restaurants. But yeah, my condition seems to be getting much better since I quit "smoking". I believe they still send out a completely Free Trial kit, only asking that you cover their cost of shipping.

Anyways, Take care! I hope I was of some help.. <3

Answer 9

Any one can develop lung cancer. Even a non smoker. We are all born with cancer in our bodies. It all depends on if later in life if the cells will errupt or not. My cousin was 22 years old when he had lung cancer, never smoked or drank. It traveled through his entire body and he passed away when he was 25.

Answer 10

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