Cancer Prevention Starts in Childhood

What to know

You can lower your children's risk of cancer later in life by getting them vaccinated against HPV and helping them make healthy choices.

Sun safety

Just a few serious sunburns raise a child's risk of skin cancer later. Children can:

• stay in the shade;
• wear a hat, sunglasses and clothes that cover arms and legs;
• use broad-spectrum sunscreen with SPF 15 or higher.

More: CDC's sun safety tips.

The HPV vaccine

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a common virus passed on during sex. It can cause cervical cancer, and some cancers of the vulva, vagina, penis, anus and oropharynx (the back of the throat, including the base of the tongue and tonsils). The HPV vaccine protects against the types that most often cause cancer.

"I gave HPV vaccine to both my sons when they turned 11," says pediatrician Dr. Jose Rodriguez in CDC's video Why Do 11- to 12-Year-Olds Need the HPV Vaccine?

Activity and a healthy weight

Children with obesity are more likely to become adults with obesity, which raises the risk of serious problems, including cancer. Help them build healthy eating habits and stay active:

• ages 3 to 5: active throughout the day;
• older children and teens: at least an hour a day.

More: tips for healthy routines.

Talk about smoking

• Nearly 9 in 10 adults who smoke daily first tried it by age 18.
• About 1,600 young people in the U.S. smoke their first cigarette every day.
• In 2021, about 1 in 3 high school students said they had tried a tobacco product.

Tell your children why you don't want them to smoke. And keep them away from secondhand smoke, which causes serious illness in children and adults — including lung cancer in adults who never smoked. For help quitting: smokefree.gov.

Sources

Based on "Cancer Prevention Starts in Childhood," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, February 13, 2025; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The page's two stock photographs are not reproduced; its video is on YouTube only.