Description: THURSDAY, August 16 (HealthDay News) -- While the number of deaths from cancer have been declining, many malignancies could be prevented by exercising, eating right, maintaining a healthy weight and not smoking, a new federal report finds.

The President's Cancer Panel issues a report every year that focuses on one aspect of what is happening in the United States in terms of cancer.

This year's effort "centers on lifestyle changes, and two issues that are actually quite different," said panel member Margaret L. Kripke, executive vice president and chief academic officer at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, in Houston.

One issue is nutrition, exercise and the fight against obesity, and the other is the battle to cut tobacco use, Kripke said.

"We tried to think of what would have the biggest impact on reducing cancer mortality," she said. "If you consider that 15 to 20 percent of cancer deaths are related to obesity and another 30 percent of cancer deaths a