| |
Four coffees a day 'will
keep mouth cancer at bay
Main
Article page | Health page|
Fitness articles|
Diseases
'By David Derbyshire
Drinking four cups of coffee a day protects
against oral cancer, a study shows.
People with a heavy coffee habit are 39 per cent less likely to suffer from
cancers of the mouth and pharynx, it suggests.
Doctors say people should drink coffee in moderation because caffeine can
increase heart rate and blood pressure.
Cancer conundrum: Studies suggest that chemicals found in coffee can both cause
and prevent cancer
However, the researchers insist evidence is strong that some of the 1,000
chemicals in coffee - including antioxidants - can offer protection against the
cancers.
The American scientists used information gleaned from nine studies from Europe,
America and Central America, which compared the coffee habits of around 5,000
cancer patients and more than 9,000 healthy people.
After taking into account smoking, diet and alcohol habits, they found that
regular coffee drinkers were 39 per cent less likely to develop cancers of the
mouth and pharynx than people who drank no coffee.
Lead author Dr Mia Hashibe, from the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, said:
'Since coffee is so widely used and there is a relatively high incidence and low
survival rate of these forms of cancers, our results have important public
health implications that need to be further addressed.
What makes our results so unique is that we had a very large sample size, and
since we combined data across many studies, we had more statistical power to
detect associations between cancer and coffee.' |
Around 5,500 Britons are diagnosed with cancers of the lips, tongue, tonsils,
gum and other parts of the mouth each year, while 1,800 people die from the
disease.
Oral cancer - mostly caused by smoking and alcohol - is on the rise in young and
middle aged men.
It is difficult to treat and is sometimes disfiguring. Other risk factors
include a poor diet and harmful ultraviolet rays from the sun on the lips.
Early symptoms include ulcers that fail to heal, or which bleed easily, red or
red and white patches in the mouth that do not go away, lumps in the tongue,
mouth or throat, difficulty swallowing or chewing and persistent pain.
Studies on the links between coffee and cancer have produced confusing and
sometimes contradictory results.
These results confused because coffee drinking could be a marker for some other
lifestyle factor that increases cancer risk, such as smoking and alcohol.
However, recent studies have shown that coffee may reduce the risk of cancers of
the pancreas, colon, brain and gullet.
The study was published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, a
journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Courtesy:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/
| |
|