Organic fruits and vegetables might reduce cancer risk, study finds

Organic fruits and vegetables might significantly decrease your risk of getting diagnosed with cancer, a new research has found.

Organic foods are those cultivated without using any fertilizer or chemicals such as pesticides and herbicides. They are often fresher because they don’t contain preservatives.

The study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, said people who consume the most organic foods have a 25 percent lower cancer risk compared with those who eat the least.

Breaking down the result, Julia Baudry, lead researcher, said eating more organically grown foods was linked to a 34 percent reduced risk of postmenopausal breast cancer, a 76 percent decreased risk for all lymphomas and an 86 percent reduced risk for non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Baudry said: “If our findings are confirmed, organic food consumption may contribute to cancer prevention.”

To arrive at the findings, Baudry and her colleagues analysed data from nearly 69,000 people taking part in an ongoing French study of the associations between nutrition and health.

She added: “We did consider a variety of factors that may be involved in the relationship, such as sociodemographic, socioeconomic and lifestyle factors, as well as family history of cancer, or healthier diet in terms of nutrients and food consumption.

“Controlling for these factors did not substantially modify the findings.”

The study advised that the consumption of fruits and vegetables, whether conventional or organic, can improve overall diet quality and reduce your risk of chronic disease, including cancer.