British study: Plant-based foods reduce the risk of cancer

A new study co-sponsored by the World Cancer Research Fund and Cancer Research UK has found that vegetarian or vegetarian diets are more likely to increase the risk of cancer than meat, including fish..

A team of researchers from the Department of Cancer Epidemiology at the University of Oxford has departed. Today Exploring the role of potential mediators between these associations, with the aim of evaluating the relationship of vegetarians with the risks of all types of cancer, colon cancer, menopausal breast cancer and prostate cancer..

The Oxford-based team examined the relationship between food and cancer risk by analyzing data from more than 472,000 British adults collected from the UK Biobank between 2006 and 2010..

Based on the completed nutrition questions, participants were classified:

• Group 1: Regular meat eaters (meat eaters more than 5 times a week)
• Group 2: Low meat consumers (meat eaters 5 or less per week)
• Group 3: Fish eaters (fish eaters and vegetarians)
• Group 4: Vegetarians (non-vegetarian of all meats)

After an average follow-up of 11.4 years, 54,961 cancers were diagnosed, including 5,882 colon cancers, 7,537 menopausal breast cancers and 9,501 prostate cancers..

Study findings:

Eating less meat, eating fish or eating vegetarian food is all associated with a lower risk of all types of cancer compared to those who regularly eat meat..

Menopausal women are less likely to develop breast cancer, but overweight or obese women are less likely to benefit from a vegetarian diet, meaning that BMI plays a role in cancer..

In men, eating fish or eating a vegetarian diet is associated with a lower risk of prostate cancer. However, other factors such as smoking and BMI may also play a role.