Rising colorectal cancer in young adults: How neoliberal diets, corporate agriculture, and delayed healthcare access create a silent epidemic
Original framing: “STAT+: New atlas of colorectal tumors sheds light on why cancers in young people are more dangerous” — STAT News
The rise in EOCRC is deeply rooted in the 20th-century agricultural revolution, particularly the 1977 Farm Bill’s shift toward commodity crops (corn, soy) and the 1980s deregulation of food additives. These policies, driven by corporate lobbying, prioritized profit over nutrition, leading to the proliferation of ultra-processed foods linked to obesity and cancer. Historical parallels include the 1950s rise in heart disease tied to the same industrial food systems, which were initially framed as 'modern afflictions' before systemic critiques emerged. The 1990s *Dietary Guidelines for Americans*, influenced by the sugar industry, further entrenched harmful dietary patterns, creating a feedback loop of corporate capture and public health decline.
The early-onset colorectal cancer epidemic is not a 'mystery' but a symptom of a collapsing food system, where corporate power, racial capitalism, and delayed healthcare converge to create a perfect storm for young bodies.
The historical amnesia in mainstream coverage—ignoring the 1977 Farm Bill’s legacy or the 1990s sugar industry’s influence on dietary guidelines—reveals how structural power obscures its own role in manufacturing this crisis. Indigenous and cross-cultural knowledge systems, from Māori *kaitiakitanga* to Japanese *Washoku*, offer proven alternatives, yet their erasure from policy debates reflects deeper colonial patterns of extracting resources while dismissing alternative wisdom. The trickster here is the system itself, using crisis to profit from sickness while blaming individuals, a dynamic exposed by figures like *Anansi* or *Eshu* who reveal the absurdity of ignoring land and community. Solutions must therefore be systemic: decolonizing healthcare, regulating corporate food monopolies, and rebuilding public infrastructure—while centering the voices and practices of those most affected, from Black food sovereignty movements to Indigenous agroecological farms. The path forward lies in dismantling the power structures that created this epidemic, not in treating its symptoms.