Coffee may prevent deadly cancer
Tuesday December 8th, 2009
Coffee drinking may help spare men from developing a deadly cancer, researchers reported today.
Heavy
coffee drinkers were found to be 60 per cent less likely than non-coffee
drinkers to develop aggressive prostate cancer, a conference is to be
told.
Researchers said caffeine was not responsible - decaffeinated coffee was just as effective.
The research, involving nearly 50,000 men, was being reported to the American Association for Cancer Research Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research Conference in Houston, Texas, USA. Nearly 5,000 developed prostate cancer during a 20 year period.
Researcher Dr Kathryn Wilson, of Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts, USA, said: "Very few lifestyle factors have been consistently associated with prostate cancer risk, especially with risk of aggressive disease, so it would be very exciting if this association is confirmed in other studies.
"Our results do suggest there is no reason to stop drinking coffee out of any concern about prostate cancer."
* Regular exercise can help reduce death rates among men who develop prostate cancer, the conference will also hear.
Three hours a week of vigorous exercise was linked to a one third reduction in the risk of death, according to a study of some 2,600 patients, also conducted by Harvard researchers.
And four hours of walking a week cut the risk by nearly a quarter, researchers found.
* A second study reported at the same conference suggests that fish oil may help prevent cancer of the gut.
A study of nearly 1,800 people in North Carolina, USA, found that regular eating of long-chain omega-3 fatty acids, found in sea-food, were linked to a 39 percent reduced risk of colon cancer - but only in people of European origin.
Researcher Dr Sangmi Kim, of the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, said: "An increase in dietary intake of long-chain omega-3 fatty acids, which mainly come from fish and seafood, may be beneficial in the prevention of distal large bowel cancer."
Tags: Cancer | Diet & Food | Men’s Health | North America
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