Young women smokers 'high cancer risks'

MELBOURNE - Young women may be more susceptible than their male counterparts to the cancer-causing effects of smoking.

A New Zealand study released yesterday found that people who developed lung cancer before the age of 45 were more likely to be female.

Dr Megan Cornere, respiratory registrar at Auckland's Green Lane Hospital, said the findings were a major concern because of the rate at which teenage girls and young women continued to take up smoking.

"The cancer risks of smoking are applicable not just to older smokers," she told the Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand's annual scientific meeting in Melbourne.

"Our study is further evidence that young women seem to be at increased risk of lung cancer."

Researchers compared the characteristics of people under 45 who developed lung cancer with those who had a later onset of the disease.

Women made up only 32 per cent of patients over 45, but 67 per cent of the younger group.

Although there might be genetic or other factors that influenced the onset of lung cancer, between 80 and 90 per cent of the study group had been or were still smokers.

In New Zealand, lung cancer represents 12 per cent of all registered cancer cases and 20 per cent of all cancer deaths.

Another study presented yesterday contradicted the long-held belief that breastfeeding protects infants against asthma and allergic skin conditions.

The joint Austrian-New Zealand study found no significant reduction in the lifetime diagnosis of asthma among infants who had been breast-fed compared with those who had not.

It also found that, while breast-feeding did protect infants against hayfever, breast-fed babies were more likely to develop eczema.

Wellington School of Medicine paediatric research fellow Dr Angela Zacharasiewicz said the conclusions were based on a survey of 35,000 Austrian children.

Breast-feeding had advantages for child nutrition, had been found to have a protective effect against infection and was an important means of mother-child bonding, she said.

But she cautioned against over-emphasising the importance of a recommended length of exclusive breast-feeding for allergy prevention.

Dr Zacharasiewicz said some assumptions were widely taken for granted without convincing evidence.

She described the belief that breast-feeding protected infants from asthma in the long term as a simplistic one.

"There are many other factors that influence the development of a child's immune system, including lifestyle, early childhood infection and socioeconomic status," she said.

She hoped the research results would allow women to make an informed choice about how they fed their child.

"For one reason or another, some women choose not to breast-feed, so we should be clear about the evidence for actual advantages concerning allergies and asthma."

- NZPA