Bbc--red Meat Intake Linked To Breast Cancer Risk

[Lani]

Red meat link to breast cancers

Eating too much meat has been linked to bowel cancer
Eating large amounts of red meat may double young women's breast cancer risk, a study suggests.
US researchers writing in Archives of Internal Medicine looked at over 90,000 pre-menopausal women.

Having one-and-a-half servings of red meat per day almost doubled the risk of hormone receptor-positive breast cancer compared to three or fewer per week.



Researchers from Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston studied women who were part of the Nurses' Health Study II from 1989 to 2003.

The women filled out questionnaires in 1991, 1995 and 1999, on which they recorded how often they regularly consumed more than 130 different foods and beverages.

Every two years, they reported whether or not they had developed breast cancer. Cases were confirmed through hospital records and pathology reports.

The researchers also looked at the whether the women's tumours were fuelled by the hormones oestrogen or progesterone.

By the end of the study, 1,021 women had developed breast cancer.

There were 512 cases of cancers which were oestrogen and progesterone-receptor positive, 167 that were negative, 110 with mixed status and 232 with unknown status.

Public health implications

When the researchers looked at meat intake and cancer risk, it was found that women who ate more than one-and-a-half servings of red meat per day had almost double the risk of hormone receptor-positive breast cancer compared with those who ate three or fewer servings per week.

Writing in Archives of Internal Medicine, the researchers led by Dr Eunyoung Cho, said: "Several biological mechanisms may explain the positive association between red meat intake and hormone receptor-positive breast cancer risk.

They say cooked and processed red meats have been shown to contain cancer-causing chemicals such as heterocyclic amines which are created during the cooking of red meat.

A second potential link is the growth hormones which are given to cattle in the US, although not in Europe.

The researchers also say red meat is a source of heme iron, which previous research has shown fuels the growth of oestrogen-induced tumours.

Dr Cho's team added: "Given that most of the risk factors for breast cancer are not easily modifiable, these findings have potential public health implications in preventing breast cancer and should be evaluated further."