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# Too much folate may boost breast cancer risk - study
- URL: https://www.foodconsumer.org/folate_may_boost_breast_cancer_2710100657/
- Published: 2010-10-27T07:55:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-22T15:52:31.000Z
- Description: Among 70,656 postmenopausal women followed from 1992, 3,898 developed breast cancer, and those in the highest quintile of dietary folate intake had a 12% higher risk. The authors saw no dose-response trend, and found no link for vitamin B-6, B-12 or total folate.
- Author: Food Consumer
- Tags: Vitamins, Nutrition, Breast Cancer, Folate, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B6, #vivvo-import

A new study in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggests that high intake of folate and other one-carbon metabolism related nutrients may boost risk of breast cancer in postmenopausal women.

Folate is a vitamin commonly added to flours and bakery products as a fortifying agent to help prevent birth defects. 

But the current study led by Victoria L Stevens and colleagues from the Epidemiology Research American Cancer Society Atlanta Georgia shows high intake of folate was associated with significantly increased risk of breast cancer.

For the study, Stevens et al. examined the association of dietary and total folate, vitamin b-6, vitamin b-12, methionine and alcohol intakes with breast cancer risk in 70,656 postmenopausal women whose dietary information was collected at baseline in 1992.

During the follow-up between 1992 and June 2005, 3,898 women developed breast cancer.

The researchers found postmenopausal women with the highest quintile of dietary folate intake was correlated with a 12 percent increased risk of breast cancer. The elevated risk was not modified by other nutrients or alcohol. But no dose-response trend was observed.

Vitamin b-6, total folate, and vitamin b-12 were not found associated with breast cancer risk while methionine was inversely linked with breast cancer risk.

This is not the first study that found the association between high folate intake and increased risk of cancer.

Foods high in methionine include eggs, cheese, seaweed, seeds, nuts, fish, mollusks, soy protein, and butter.

Foods high in folate include brewer's yeast, lentils, romaine lettuce, pinto beans, okra, black beans, black eyed peas, kidney beans, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, collard greens, garbanzo beans, asparagus, and beets.

The researchers did not know why high dietary folate was linked with high breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women. All the folate-rich foods listed seem to be healthy foods or supplements.

They acknowledged that more research is needed. The study is observatiobal and it does not reveal a causal relation between high intake of folate and increased breast cancer risk.

Breast cancer is diagnosed in more than 175,000 individuals and kill about 50,000 each year in the United States, according to American Cancer Society.