Exposure to tobacco smoke – both in childhood and adulthood – may increase the risk of breast cancer in women, reports the British Medical Journal.
The study by Dr. Juhua Luo’s team at West Virginia University included 79 women aged 990 to 50.
Within 10 years, 3250 cases of invasive breast cancer were diagnosed in them. They found that compared to non-smokers and non-smokers, the risk of developing breast cancer was one-third higher in patients who had decades of secondhand smoke.
10 years of childhood exposure to tobacco smoke and 20 years of smoking at home or 10 years at work in adulthood – each of these options increased the risk of cancer by 32%.
The authors of the current research emphasize that their results still need to be confirmed by subsequent studies. However, reducing smoking will not hurt. (PAP)