CONSUMPTION OF MEAT AND FRUIT IN RELATION TO ORAL AND ESOPHAGEAL CANCER - A CROSS-NATIONAL-STUDY

Using data from 59 countries, we conducted an international comparison study to identify nutritional predictors of age-adjusted oral and eso phageal cancer mortality rates. Statistical models accounted for per c apita tobacco disappearance data, alcohol consumption, and various mea sures of socioeconomic status. For oral cancer, stepwise regression re sults showed protective effects for milk/dairy products (B = -0.030, p < 0.0001) and cabbage consumption (B = -0.391, p = 0.01) and increase d risk from vegetable oil (B = 0.072, p = 0.04) and excess animal fat calories (B = 0.344, p < 0.0001) as well as marginally increased risk from cereals (B = 0.008, p = 0.08). Results were obtained after accoun ting for all background factors, including sex (model R2 = 0.52). For esophageal cancer, stepwise results indicated protective effects for f ruit (B = -0.046, p = 0.0006) and total caloric intake (B = -0.013, p < 0.0001) and increased risk from vegetable oil (B = 0.061, p = 0.04) and meat (B = 0.031, p < 0.0001) consumption (model R2 = 0.55). When a nalyzed separately by sex, results were similar, indicating that the r isk factors are probably the same in both sexes, even though women con sistently have fewer deaths, on average, from these cancers. On the ba sis of results from stepwise regression models, we also fitted general linear models for mortality rates of each cancer site, and results we re similar in terms of magnitude and direction of effects. Although th e evidence provided by this type of analysis using data aggregated by country is limited in terms of control for potential confounding effec ts and modeling of possible effect modification, an effect of high mea t, animal product, or vegetable oil and low fruit and cabbage consumpt ion is consistent with the known biology of these tumors.