Alcohol & breast cancer.

Women who drink regularly may cut their risk of breast cancer by cutting back on beer, wine, or hard liquor hard liquor A popular term for beverages with a high–often > 30% by volume–ie, 60 proof alcohol content–eg, gin, rum, vodka, whiskey; HLs are preferred by alcoholics as a steady state of low-level inebriation is easier to maintain. See Standard drink. . That's the conclusion of researchers who pooled the data from six studies so they could keep track of more than 300,000 women for up to 11 years. The results:

* The risk of breast cancer rose by nine percent for every ten grams of alcohol (that's between three-quarters and one drink) a day.

* Women who drank two to five servings of alcohol a day had a 40 percent higher risk of breast cancer than nondrinkers. "The bottom line is that we have strong evidence that breast cancer risk increases linearly with alcohol consumption," says co-author co·au·thor or co-au·thor
n.
A collaborating or joint author.

tr.v. co·au·thored, co·au·thor·ing, co·au·thors
To be a collaborating or joint author of: "He and a colleague . . . Stephanie Smith-Warner of the Harvard School of Public Health The Harvard School of Public Health is (colloquially, HSPH) is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Longwood Area of the Boston, Massachusetts neighborhood of Mission Hill, next to Harvard Medical School and Cambridge, Massachusetts, .

Women should decide how much, if any, alcohol to drink after weighing the risks and benefits with their physicians, she adds. And that means considering not just the risk of cancer and heart disease, but traffic accidents and the risk of alcoholism alcoholism, disease characterized by impaired control over the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Alcoholism is a serious problem worldwide; in the United States the wide availability of alcoholic beverages makes alcohol the most accessible drug, and alcoholism is .

Journal of the American Medical Association JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association is an international peer-reviewed general medical journal, published 48 times per year by the American Medical Association. JAMA is the most widely circulated medical journal in the world. 279:535, 1998.

COPYRIGHT 1998 Center for Science in the Public Interest
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.

Reader Opinion

Article Details
Printer friendly Cite/link Email Feedback
Title Annotation:	results of studies show that risk increases in relation to increased alcohol intake
Author:	Liebman, Bonnie
Publication:	Nutrition Action Healthletter
Article Type:	Brief Article
Date:	May 1, 1998
Words:	175
Previous Article:	Instant press coverage. (flawed results of study about how healthy oatmeal is for people is used in marketing)(Brief Article)
Next Article:	Alcohol as cure-all. (alcohol may not reduce risks of heart disease and cancers in men)(Brief Article)
Topics:	Alcohol in the body Research Breast cancer Risk factors Women Health aspects Women's health Health aspects

Related Articles
Breast cancer's link to alcohol assailed.
Cholesterol-cancer clues.
For women only. (questions and answers on women's health)(includes an interview with Harvard Medical School researcher, JoAnn E. Manson)(Cover Story)
Breast cancer. (includes related article with dietary and other tips to reduce risks of developing breast cancer)(Cover Story)
Breast cancer and alcohol.(Brief Article)
In developed and developing countries, breast cancer risk is reduced by 4% for each year of breastfeeding. (Digests).
Study sheds new light on vitamin E.(HEALTH CARE VALLEY)(women's health)
Keeping abreast: the latest on diet and breast cancer.
The abortion-breast cancer link: a medical-legal nightmare on the horizon.
Reducing breast cancer risk.