A new study has found that women who regularly eat red meat appear to face an increased risk for a common form of breast cancer.
The study of more than 90,000 women, released Monday, found that the more red meat the women consumed in their twenties, thirties and forties, the greater their risk for developing breast cancer.
The study by researchers of the Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, in the northeastern state of Massachusetts, is the first to examine the relationship between consumption of red meat and breast cancer in pre-menopausal women. It is also the first to make a distinction between the type of breast cancer linked to red-meat intake.
Researchers report that women who ate more than one and one-half servings of red meat per day increased their risk for the hormone receptor-positive type of breast cancer, which is fueled by female hormones, estrogen and progesterone.
Scientists say more research is needed to confirm the links between red meat intake and breast cancer and to explore the possible reasons for it.
But researchers say the findings provide enough motivation to limit the consumption of red meat, which is already known to increase the risk of colon cancer.
Some information for this report was provided by Reuters.