Saturday Aug 2, 2014 (foodconsumer.org) -- Scientists at Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, Massachusetts, USA and colleagues has recently published a study in BMJ suggesting that eating red meat in early adulthood may increase risk of breast cancer.

The study shows that high consumption of red meat in early adulthood was associated with 22% increased risk of  breast cancer and higher intakes of food components including poultry, fish, eggs, legumes and nuts was not correlated with increased overall risk of breast cancer.

Specifically, among postmenopausal women, higher intake of poultry was associated with 22% reduced risk while among premenopausal women, higher intake of poultry was not associated with the risk.

The findings were derived from data from 88,803 premenopausal women from the Nurses' Health Study II, who were followed up for 20 years during which 2,830 women were diagnosed with breast cancer.

When one serving of red meat per day was replaced with one serving of legumes per day,  risk of breast cancer by 15% among all women and 19% among premenopausal women.

Also, one serving of poultry per day to replace one serving of red meat per day was correlated with 17% reduced risk of breast cancer in all women and with 24% reduced risk among postmenopausal women.

Substituting one serving of combined legumes, poultry, fish and nuts for one serving of red meat was found able to reduce breast cancer risk by 14% in all women and premenopausal women.

The study concluded "Higher red meat intake in early adulthood may be a risk factor for breast cancer, and replacing red meat with a combination of legumes, poultry, nuts and fish may reduce the risk of breast cancer."  (David Liu)

Farvid MS, Cho E, Chen WY, Eliassen AH, Willett WC.  Dietary protein sources in early adulthood and breast cancer incidence: prospective cohort study.  BMJ. 2014 Jun 10;348:g3437.