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Including olive oil in your diet may help reduce your risk of developing
colon cancer, Spanish researchers suggest. Their study results
showed that rats fed an olive oil-supplemented diet had a
lower risk of colon cancer than those fed diets supplemented
with safflower oil. In fact, the rats that received olive
oil had colon cancer rates almost as low as those fed fish
oil, which several studies have already linked to a reduction
in colon cancer risk.
Adding olive oil to the diet has other advantages as well.
There has been interest in the health benefits of olive oil
for some time, but not usually with a focus on colon cancer.
The cardiovascular benefits of diets higher in olive oil are
well established in improving the ratio of good-to-bad cholesterol.
In addition, olive oil does not promote the secretion of bile
acids as many other fats do.
Animal studies have shown that a diet high in some kinds
of fat (such as corn or safflower oil) increases the risk
of colon cancer, which depends on both the amount of fat consumed
and the type of fatty acid it contains. Additional studies
have indicated that dietary fish oil inhibits or prevents
colon cancer.
Rats given a diet high in safflower oil had more premalignant
changes in the linings of their colons and a higher incidence
of colon cancer than those fed a diet high in fish oil or
olive oil. Examination of colon tissue revealed that a diet
high in fish oil or olive oil reduced the bowel tissue concentrations
of arachidonate, a substance that enables the formation of
cancer, to a greater extent than did a diet high in safflower
oil.
The authors note that previous studies showed that fish oil
can slow the division of rectal cells in humans, but the effect
of olive oil on colon cells has been scarcely assessed, leading
them to conclude that their findings on olive oil may be of
relevance. Oleic acid is the predominant fatty acid in olive
oil (about 75%), but oleic acid is also found in fats that
are in foods linked to cancer in animal studies, such as beef;
poultry; and corn, soybean, and sunflower seed oil.
The researchers therefore believe that other components of
olive oil such as squalene and flavonoid and polyphenolic
compounds may have a chemoprotective effect against colon
cancer.
Gut
2000;46:191-199.
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