030116 Meat, Eggs NOT Linked to Breast Cancer

New York - New research shows that women who consume animal proteins such as red meat are no more likely to develop breast cancer than women who choose to eschew such foods, Boston researchers report.

The new study, which looked at data from almost 90,000 women, also found that it made no difference whether women ate rare or well-done meat, according to the report published Thursday in the online issue of the International Journal of Cancer.

This doesn't mean that women should feel free to eat more meat, the study's lead author Dr. Michelle D. Holmes said in an interview with Reuters Health.

"Unfortunately, there are other reasons to watch meat intake," said Holmes, an assistant professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. "Meat contains high amounts of saturated fat, which has been linked to heart attacks, which are an even bigger killer of women. Meat consumption is also linked to colon cancer."

Scientists have long suspected that meat might be unhealthy, Holmes said.

"The theory came from the observation that rich countries where people eat more meat have higher rates of breast cancer than poor countries where people eat little meat," she added. "Of course there are other differences between people in these countries, like the amount of physical exercise women get and their reproductive patterns."

Beyond this, there were several studies that compared the eating habits of women who had cancer to those who were free of the disease.

The problem with this kind of study is that it is based on women's memories of meat consumption, Holmes said. "There tends to be a recall bias," she explained. "In retrospective studies, we talk to women who are sick with cancer and those who are not. It is well known that people who are sick are searching for an answer as to why they became ill and they can remember things differently."

The new results are based on data from the Nurse's Health Study. At the beginning of the study, which included 121,700 female nurses, the women were aged 30 to 55 years.

To learn about diet and cancer, Holmes and her colleagues looked at the data from 88,647 of the women who did not have cancer at the beginning of the study. At several points during the 18 years examined by Holmes and her colleagues, the women were surveyed about their eating habits. The women were also asked biennially whether they had been diagnosed with breast cancer in the previous two years. The researchers also kept track of deaths among the women.

When Holmes and her colleagues compared the dietary habits of women who developed breast cancer to those who stayed healthy, the researchers found no association between any kind of meat consumption and increased cancer risk. Eggs were also not associated with increased cancer risk.

Although the researchers saw no relationship between well-done meat and breast cancer risk, Holmes wants to study the issue of charred meat further, she said. That's because the researchers didn't ask detailed questions about cooking methods, Holmes said. Future studies will look at whether charring meat can lead to an increased risk of breast cancer, she added.

SOURCE: International Journal of Cancer 2003.

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