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Eating eggs may protect against breast cancer

February 21, 2003

Women who used to eat more eggs during their high school years may be less likely to develop breast cancer. New research from Harvard, published in Breast Cancer Research, found that higher levels of egg consumption during adolescence are associated with a decreased risk of breast cancer. Eating dietary fiber and vegetable fat was also attributed to a reduced risk of developing the disease whilst butter appeared to increase the risk.

There is much speculation about the links between diet and breast cancer. It is well known, for example, that some immigrant populations in the United States have lower rates of breast cancer than the general population. But, within a generation the risk of developing breast cancer has normally risen to that of the general population. Such observations suggest that exposure to certain foods during childhood and adolescence may be critical in establishing a woman's risk of developing breast cancer.

Lindsay Frazier and colleagues from Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health asked 121,707 women about their eating habits during high school years. They were asked how many servings they had eaten daily of foods such as milk, fruit, vegetables, meats, and sweets, which account for major sources of fat, vitamins and other essential nutrients. The analysis was carefully controlled to take into account other factors that may affect the risk of developing breast cancer, such as family history, diagnosis of benign breast disease, and use of hormone replacement therapy.

The results of the survey revealed that eating more eggs, vegetable fat and dietary fiber between the ages of 12-18 may decrease the risk for breast cancer, whilst high consumption of butter appeared to increase the risk. The researchers suggest that eggs may protect because of their high levels of essential amino acids, vitamins and minerals, and dietary fiber may have a similar effect through its ability to bind estrogen within the digestive system. Estrogen, a sex hormone, is essential for the normal growth and development of the breast and, yet, has also been associated with increasing a woman's risk for breast cancer.

It is less clear why butter appears to have such a radically different effect from vegetable oils. The authors believe that more information on the composition of vegetable oils will be needed before an explanation can be given. They stress that their work represents a preliminary study and that future studies are needed to establish a clearer picture of the links between diet and breast cancer.

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This article is freely available online, according to Breast Cancer Research's policy of open access to research articles http://breast-cancer-research.com/mkt/1201/info/press/bcr583.html

BioMed Central Limited