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  • Study: Some Supplements Might Fuel Tumors

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    Getting nutrients from tablets is not as good as getting them naturally from food. Foods like fruit and vegetables contain lots of vitamins, but also many other beneficial substances such as fibre, minerals and antioxidants. Dietary fibre can help to ensure a healthier digestive system and reduce the risk of bowel cancer, while antioxidants help protect against the damaging effects of free radicals in the body. Therefore eating whole foods is best to obtain maximum benefits.

    Certain supplements that people once hoped would fight cancer may in fact fuel tumors, possibly by knocking out some of the body’s natural defenses against cancer, Swedish researchers reported Wednesday.

    Tiny lung tumors grew and spread far more quickly in mice given vitamin E and an antioxidant supplement called acetylcysteine, the researchers reported. Further checks showed the antioxidants interfered with an important cancer-blocking protein called p53.

    Their findings may help explain startling studies that suggest smokers who take certain supplements are in fact more likely to develop lung cancer, and they may help explain why popping vitamins and other supplements doesn’t seem to benefit people’s health much.

    “The antioxidants caused the mice to die twice as fast,” Martin Bergo, a researcher at the University of Gothenburg in Gothenburg, Sweden who led the study, told reporters on a conference call.

    It wasn’t what they were expecting to find. And what’s odd is the supplements also …

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    michael

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