Along the streets of the internet you must have come a cross a statement: "soy causes breast cancer".This must have stirred some worry in you especially if you are a soy lover or if you use soy as a substitute for milk, meat and eggs.
Where is the idea coming from?
Soy contains Isoflavones, a plant estrogens.This similarity to human estrogen is the reason people mistakenly believe taking soy is related to breast cancer risk. The human estrogen is quite different from plant estrogen and therefore plant estrogen definately has different effects on human body.
How does breast cancer cells grow?
Breast cancer use human estrogen to grow and spread and so people have assumed that eating the phytoesteogen in soy could increase estrogen in their body and cause or increase breast cancer growth.
What is actually the truth?
In the contrary, Phytoestrogen in soy binds to human estrogen receptors thus blocking estrogen and therefore reduces breast cancer.
What do studies say?
No study has proved so far that soy increases or causes breast cancer. However, a number of studies have shown that soy actually reduces breast cancer risks. For example, In a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), showed that 5,000 breast cancer survivors who were part of the Shanghai Breast Cancer Survival Study and who ate soy had a lower risk for death and cancer recurrence. In the journal PLOS ONE it was found that in postmenopausal people from Western countries, soy was greatly protective against breast cancer.
Two other separate studies from 2009 also found that soy helped protect against breast cancer.
Also, in a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, roughly 73,000 Chinese women who were part of the Shanghai Women’s Health Study and who reported consuming high levels of soy consistently during adolescence and adulthood had a substantially lower risk of breast cancer.
Very Insightful. Thank you so much
ReplyDelete