These findings are consistent with the well-established “healthy volunteer” effect, which has been demonstrated in other volunteer-based cohort studies (15–17). Other prospective studies have also found lower rates of all-cause mortality and incident cancer in comparison with national rates (18–21). The only examined health condition that had a higher incidence rate in UK Biobank than in the general population was prostate cancer, which might reflect higher rates of voluntary prostate-specific antigen testing (and subsequent prostate cancer diagnosis) among health-conscious men. In contrast, lung cancer incidence rates were markedly lower in UK Biobank across all age and sex groups, almost certainly caused by the lower prevalence of smoking compared with the general population.
