[Kanda444]

Alcohol Blamed for 1 in Every 30 Cancer Deaths


WebMD News from HealthDay
By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter


THURSDAY, Feb. 14 (HealthDay News) -- For anyone who still thinks that drinking does not contribute to cancer, a new report finds that alcohol is to blame for one in every 30 cancer deaths each year in the United States.

The connection is even more pronounced with breast cancer, with 15 percent of those deaths related to alcohol consumption, the researchers added.

And don't think that drinking in moderation will help, because 30 percent of all alcohol-related cancer deaths are linked to drinking 1.5 drinks or less a day, the report found.

Alcohol is a cancer-causing agent that's in "plain sight," but people just don't see it, said study author Dr. David Nelson, director of the Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.

"As expected, people who are higher alcohol users were at higher risk, but there was really no safe level of alcohol use," he stressed.

Moderate drinking has been associated with heart benefits, Nelson noted. "But, in the broader context of all the issues and all the problems that alcohol is related to, alcohol causes 10 times as many deaths as it prevents," he said.

The best thing people who believe they are at risk for cancer can do is reduce their alcohol consumption, Nelson said. "From a cancer prevention perspective, the less you drink, the lower your risk of an alcohol-related cancer and, obviously, if one doesn't drink at all then that's the lowest risk," he said.

The report was published online Feb. 14 in the American Journal of Public Health.

To determine the risks related to drinking and cancer, Nelson's team compiled data from a variety of sources, including the 2009 Alcohol Epidemiologic Data System, the 2009 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System and the 2009-2010 National Alcohol Survey.

Along with breast cancer in women, cancers of the mouth, throat and esophagus were also common causes of alcohol-related cancer deaths in men, accounting for about 6,000 deaths each year.

Each alcohol-related cancer death accounted for an average of 18 years of potential life lost, the researchers added.

Previous studies have shown drinking is a risk factor for cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus, liver, colon, rectum and, in women, breast cancer, the researchers noted.

According to the American Cancer Society, it's not entirely clear how alcohol might raise cancer risk. Alcohol might act as a chemical irritant to sensitive cells, impeding their DNA repair, or damage cells in other ways. It might also act as a "solvent" for other carcinogens, such as those found in tobacco smoke, helping those chemicals enter into cells more easily. Or alcohol might affect levels of key hormones such as estrogen, upping odds for breast cancer.

One expert says the findings in this study are consistent with what has been shown before.

"Nobody is recommending that if you do not drink to start drinking for any reason," said Susan Gapstur, vice president of epidemiology at the cancer society. "If you do drink, limit your consumption."

Gapstur did point out that smoking is a much more powerful factor in cancer deaths than alcohol. Although some 20,000 cancer deaths can be attributed to alcohol each year, more than 100,000 cancer deaths are caused by smoking, she said.

To strike a balance between the cancer risk of drinking and its possible benefit in preventing heart disease, Gapstur suggested talking with your doctor about the risks and benefits of drinking.

http://www.webmd.com/cancer/news/201...r-deaths-study

[bdjackass318]

I read somewhere I can't remember where but it said alcohol related deaths numbered more than any of the other major drug related deaths. It also said if you added all the others deaths caused by those drugs that alcohol would still outnumber those deaths. I think the drugs mentioned were pot,cocaine heroin Crystal meth. Yes i realize that there are lot more users when it comes to alcohol but to me it is still a pretty bad narcotic. At the very least it has to be a lot worse than pot but yet pot is so demonized. I don't fucking get it! It smacks of hypocrysy. Just legalize all drugs already. Just because you legalize those drugs doesn't mean that everybody is going to go try those drugs. I for one wouldn't try any of them except for weed which i already have smoked in the past. I think if you did legalize weed it would probably seriously cut into thr sales of alcohol and that would not sit well with all the corporations that make alcoholic beverages. Sorry I rant so now I will get off my soap box.

[Azimuth]

Not surprised to hear this.

Alcohol fucks you up. And it's so much harder on a woman's body than a man's. Vodka in particular is like that, will age a woman much faster than a guy. (Learned that in treatment. )

[fenek]

Speaking of treatment, go to any detox center and see who's worse off. You'll see an opiate addicts shitting a puking, drenched in sweat, a coke, crack, or meth addict sleep for twenty hours straight, and then an alcoholic, yellow as Homer Simpson, hallucinated and convulsing. Of the above, the only one with potentially lethal withdrawals is alcohol. Its a nasty, nasty drug... And its the only drug you can run a car off of!

[kellyhound]

also.

A sexually transmitted infection usually thought of in connection to cervical cancer is also tied to a five times greater risk of cancer of the vocal chords or voice box, a new report suggests.

Combining the results of 55 studies from the past two decades, Chinese researchers found 28 percent of people with laryngeal cancers had cancerous tissue that tested positive for human papillomavirus (HPV).

But that rate varied widely by study, from no throat cancer patients with HPV to 79 percent with the infection.

"We're finding that HPV appears to be linked to a number of squalors cell carcinomas of the head, neck and throat," said Dr. William Mendenhall, a radiation oncologist from the University of Florida in Gainesville who didn't participate in the analysis.

However, he told Reuters Health, "I think the risk of HPV on laryngeal cancer is probably relatively low. Most of the patients we see currently that come in with laryngeal cancer have a strong history of cigarette smoking, also heavy drinking."

Along with tobacco and alcohol, having a poor diet and exposure to certain chemicals can increase a person's risk of laryngeal and other head and neck cancers.

The American Cancer Society estimates 12,360 people will be diagnosed with laryngeal cancer in the United States in 2012 and that there will be 3,650 deaths from the disease.

Along with their larger review, researchers led by Dr. Xiangwei Li, from the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking University Medical College in Beijing, analyzed 12 studies that compared cancerous and non-cancerous tissues from a total of 638 patients. They found the cancerous throat tissue had 5.4 times the odds of testing positive for HPV infection, compared to non-cancerous tissue.

The analysis was published last week in the Journal of Infectious Diseases.

Mendenhall said that of all head and neck cancers, HPV seems to play the biggest role not in laryngeal cancer, but in cancer of the tonsils and back of the tongue.

However, he added, "the exposure is probably decades earlier. Someone who develops a base of tongue cancer when they're 50, they probably were exposed to the virus years before, in their teens or 20s."

At least half of sexually-active people get HPV at some point in their lives, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), but the virus is usually cleared by the immune system. Only some of the 40-plus HPV strains have been tied to cancer.

Based on the current findings, it's difficult to know how many of the laryngeal cancers in the original studies were actually caused by the virus, researchers said.

But Mendenhall said extending HPV vaccination to boys and young men, as the CDC has recommended, "will hopefully reduce at least some of these HPV-related cancers."

[Angelahh]

I have seen death records of people who dies of natural causes - like heart attack and then have it attributed to alcohol or smoking when the deceased hadnt smoked/drank in years... so to me, this looks like every 1 out of 30 people who die of cancer were alcoholics at some point in their life - not necessarily that they got cancer from drinking alcohol imo

[Faline]

Originally Posted by azimuth ↗

Not surprised to hear this.

Alcohol fucks you up. And it's so much harder on a woman's body than a man's. Vodka in particular is like that, will age a woman much faster than a guy. (Learned that in treatment. )

And a woman who drinks AND smokes a lot...jesus Old lady before you know it.