Wednesday, 13 December, 2000, 01:14 GMT
Smokers' cancer risk 'cut
by coffee'
Coffee drinking may cut the harmful effects of smoking
Drinking coffee may be able to cut a smoker's
chances of developing bladder cancer,
according to research.
It has been long known that smokers are at
risk of developing bladder cancer, and prior to
the Spanish study, coffee was also thought to
increase the risk slightly.
However, the new work, detailed in the Journal
of Epidemiology and Community Health,
suggests that smokers may even be reducing
the damage if they consume coffee as well.
Bladder cancer patients
from five Spanish
provinces were
questioned about their
diet, smoking habits,
coffee consumption and
other factors.
Non-coffee drinkers
who smoked were
compared to those who
both drank coffee and
smoked.
For smokers, the effect of drinking coffee was
roughly to halve the extra risk created by their
habit.
So while coffee drinkers fared better than their
non-coffee smoking counterparts, they were
still at greater risk than those who did not
smoke at all.
Still a risk
In fact, the coffee group was still three times
more likely to get bladder cancer than
non-smokers.
Just how the beverage manages to attenuate
cancer risk is a mystery, although some
studies have suggested that it may be able to
react with carcinagenic compounds to form
less harmful substances.
This is supported by
the fact that the
toxicity of caffeine on
the body is thought to
be less for cigarette
smokers.
A spokesman for the
Cancer Research
Campaign - which itself
is sponsoring research
into the links between
diet and cancer, said
that while the research
was interesting, it should be treated with
caution.
Dr Mary Berrington said: "It's a complex issue
and further, larger studies are needed. The
number of non-coffee drinkers looked at here is
quite small, and there could be other things
going on.
"The study does though re-emphasise the
important message that smoking is a major risk
factor for bladder cancer."
There are approximately 13,000 new cases of
bladder cancer diagnosed in the UK every year.
Just over half of those diagnosed five years
ago are still alive today.
--
Cheers,
Joao Paulo - Salvador,BA,Brazil
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