According to a new longitudinal study in the US, just two yogurts a week could protect the intestine from certain types of cancer.
For years, scientists have suspected that yogurt and its live bacteria will benefit gastrointestinal health, but still Not all studies On this topic, we agree on what these benefits are and when they are being reaped.
This new analysis will help explain some of the confusion.
Overall, epidemiologists found no significant association between yogurt and the overall incidence of colorectal cancer – The third most common cancer in the world The second major cause of cancer-related death.
However, when researchers divided cases of colorectal cancer into subtypes, they found important results.
The findings are consistent with several others Observational researchsuggesting that yogurt intake may have antitumor properties.
“Our research provides unique evidence of the potential benefits of yogurt.” say Shuji Ogino, an epidemiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard University.
“My lab approach is to link long-term diet and other exposures to important differences in the organization, such as the presence or absence of a particular type of bacteria. This type of detective work can be used to provide the strength of the evidence that connects the diet. It can be enhanced. For health outcomes.”
The results are observational, but they cover health and self-report lifestyles of 87,000 women and nearly 45,000 men, and have been tracked for over 30 years. The dataset of Ogino and his colleagues contains individual follow-up data totaling over 3 million years.
Individuals diagnosed with colorectal cancer who consumed two or more yogurt per week; Bifidobacteria– Positive tumors compared to people who consumed less than one meal of yogurt per month. This was especially true for proximal tumors above the intestinal tract.
Bifidobacteria It is a microorganism that is ubiquitous in the human intestines and average bowl of yogurt. In about 30% of cases of colorectal cancer, the bacteria are incorporated into tumor tissue and are generally Particularly aggressive Cancer.
Bifidobacteria It appears to thrive in a hypoxic tumor microenvironment, suggesting that its presence within a particular colon tumor is leaking through the intestinal barrier at a higher rate than typical.
Perhaps intuitively, eat more Bifidobacteria It will help prevent this leak in the long term.
initial the study It suggests that bacteria have antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and immune-activating effects, possibly affecting the integrity of the gut microbiota and the gut semi-bactericidal barrier.
Further research is needed to see whether yogurt can provide these benefits, but observational evidence is growing.
“Our findings suggest that yogurt intake may have a cancer effect on colorectal cancer with a broken bowel barrier,” the authors of the current analysis said. explain.
“More research is needed to elucidate the potential mechanisms of the effects of long-term yogurt intake on colorectal carcinogenesis.”
Proximal colon cancer compared to distal colon cancer that causes tumors further below the intestinal tract Low survival rate. So are these types of cancer increase.
The idea that food may function as preventive medicine is worth exploring even more. a Randomized trials In 2021 at Stanford University, we found that fermented foods like yogurt can affect the microbiota and immune system of healthy adults.
Andrew Chan, an epidemiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, was part of a recent analysis; say Their paper “adds to increased evidence showing a relationship with diet, gut microbiota, and colorectal cancer risk.”
“It provides an additional avenue for investigating the specific role of these factors in the risk of colorectal cancer among young people.”
This study was published in Intestinal microorganisms.
