Japanese Women: Lower Rates of Breast Cancer

maize · July 2012

"Asian countries, such as Japan, have low rates of breast cancer, while Western countries have cancer rates that are many times higher. 25,26 However, when Japanese girls are raised on westernized diets, their rate of breast cancer increases dramatically.

The traditional Japanese diet is much lower in fat, especially animal fat, than the typical Western diet. In the late 1940s, when breast cancer was particularly rare, less than 10 percent of the calories in the Japanese diet came from fat. 27 The American diet, of course, is centered on animal products, which tend to be high in fat and low in other important nutrients. The fat content of the average American diet is in the range of 37 to 40 percent of calories.

Countries with a higher intake of fat, especially animal fat, have a higher incidence of breast cancer. 25,28,29 Even within Japan, affluent women who eat meat daily have an 8.5 times higher risk of breast cancer than poorer women who rarely or never eat meat. 26 The Surgeon General's Report on Nutrition and Health 30 stated: "Indeed, a comparison of populations indicates that death rates for cancers of the breast, colon, and prostate are directly proportional to estimated dietary fat intakes."

http://www.cancerproject.org/survival/cancer_facts/breast.php

wallycat · July 2012

Wish this were the last word.

There are studies that refute that.

I was a vegetarian that ate so little fat, it was ridiculous....my twin ate anything and everything....coolwhip, animal fat, blah, blah....guess which one of us got the cancer?

I realize I am a study of 2....this article simply tries to blame the patient, IMHO.

I have even read studies that say too much fruit/veggie consumption has an inverse correlation to cancer.

Maybe it is all the pesticides.

CRAP SHOOT Sealed

Layla2525 · July 2012

Wallycat, I dont the scientists know exactly what causes brst cancer and if they do they are not saying. The China Study by Colin Campbell and all the Forks Over knives folks are saying the veggie way is the way to go because the Asians are getting less cancer and specifically less breast cancer than the USA or us.

However, Dr Mercola's website says its the dioxin in tampons. I think it may be the dioxin in the second hand smoke that was a contributor that tipped the scales towards my getting cancer since I had to sit in the back seat and breathe that stuff with the windows rolled up as my Dad was a heavy smoker all his life and my mom got the ovarian and endometrial cancer and died. He had to have a super bypass b4 he got elderly and passed due to his artery health gone done the drain with all the cigarettes but like you say lots of people smoke and eat junk and they never get cancer...so what the heck do we really know?

LtotheK · July 2012

Yes, I, too was a long-time vegetarian very concerned with my food intake. All quite healthy, save the occasional ice cream sundae. I am surrounded by women who eat like a dutchess in Marie Antoinette's court. And yet, here I am, the only chump who got BC (and perhaps a new primary--waiting very anxiously for biopsy next week). The whole thing is just a lotta unfair and unclear!

I also am surrounded by women using tampons, and heavy smokers (friends overseas). Nary a one of them got cancer.

If I have to hear one more of my European friends tell me if I'd just eat pigs feet (teasing, of course) with witches brew of blah blah and stop being so stressed, poof! I'd be cured. Kidding, of course, just echoing some of the other frustrated vegetarian voices here.

Japanese Women: Lower Rates of Breast Cancer

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