“A handful of walnuts a day could help slow the growth of cancer tumours”
An article in the Mail Online on Thursday 14th May 2015 reported that “A handful of walnuts a day could help slow the growth of cancer tumours”. In fact the study on which the article was based did not look at whether eating walnuts affects the speed that tumours grow.
Professor Paul Pharoah, Centre for Cancer Genetic Epidemiology, Department of Oncology, University of Cambridge:
“The study cited in this article did not look at the effect of dietary walnuts on the speed of growth of cancers. All that this study has demonstrated is that the biochemical composition (levels of some fatty acids and some micro RNAs) of bowel tumours in mice fed a diet that includes walnuts was different from the biochemical composition of bowel tumours in mice that were not fed walnuts. The authors then speculate that these differences might explain the findings of other studies that have suggested tumour growth in mice is affected by walnuts in the diet.”
Document type: For The Record
Published: 15 May 2015
Source: Sense About Science
