Whoever eats fruit and vegetables daily runs a smaller illness risk for mouth, throat and laryngeal or esophagus cancer. Improvements for men stood at 12% and for women 4% through the use of such a nourishing diet, with the risk lowering particularly more in persons who consumed over 300 grams per day.



This is a result of a European-wide EPIC*-Study, headed by Professor Heiner Boeing of the German Institute for Eating Research Potsdam Deer Bridge. (The expenditure for September of CAN cerium and control 2006, 17 (7):957-69, is already available over Internet.)

In Germany two study centers are involved in EPIC, German Institute for Eating Research Potsdam Deer Bridge and the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg.

The EPIC scientists analyzed data of 130,633 men and 215,271 women, collected during the EPIC study of 1992 until 1998. Gathering information on their eating habits and life circumstances was undertaken. During the evaluation the researchers considered all important admitted factors, especially concerning those that affect illness risk for these cancer forms. E.G. Tobacco and alcohol consumption.

Within the study period of approximately 5.8 years 255 study participants got sick and 97 study participants with first time mouth, throat, and Laryngeal or esophagus cancer.

After the data of the EPIC study the risks for these Kinds of cancer per 80 gram of daily fruit and vegetable goes down on average around 9 per cent. With men the cancer risk was reduced by over 12%, while it decreased with women by over 4 per cent. A risk relationship exists apparent only up to a “Threshold value" from approximately 300 gram per day. That is, whoever already consumes more than 300 gram, then their illness risk cannot be further lowered probability still further by a consumption quantity increase.

“The sex specific differences in the occurrence of the illness are remarkable. Although the number of the female study participants was clearly larger, there were new cancer illnesses from the male participants by nearly twice as much. This can be probably attributed to the generally higher alcohol and cigarette consumption of the male study participants. First of all the consumption of fruit and vegetables is lower in men from north, west and Central Europe and are way under the general consumption of women.

One should encourage therefore particularly people with very low fruit and vegetable consumption to increase their daily consumption quantity.

World-wide about 390,000 people get sick with mouth and throat cancer annually. In addition 160,000 new cases of laryngeal cancer and 412,000 new illnesses of esophagus cancer are detected annually. This corresponds to 11 per cent of all new cancer illnesses. Alcohol and cigarette consumption are the substantial factors of risk for disk epithelium cancer illnesses of the upper digestive tract.

EPIC* (European Prospective Investigation into CAN cerium and Nutrition) - study: a prospektive, 1992 study begun, which uncovers connections between nutrition and cancer and other chronic illnesses. 23 administrative centers in ten European countries with 519.000 study participants are involved in the study. The EPIC study is coordinated by Dr. Elio Riboli (international Agency on Research OF CAN cerium, Lyon, France). The Potsdamer EPIC study, in which 27,548 women and men at the age participate between 35 and 65 years, leads Professor Dr. Heiner Boeing.