What Are the Risk Factors for Breast Cancer (V)?

Obesity and high-fat diets: Obesity (being overweight) has been found to be a breast cancer risk in all studies, especially for women after menopause. Although your ovaries produce most of your estrogen, fat tissue produces a small amount of estrogen. Having more fat tissue can increase your estrogen levels and increase your likelihood of developing breast cancer.
The connection between weight and breast cancer risk is complex, however. For example, risk appears to be increased for women who gained weight as an adult but is not increased among those who have been overweight since childhood. Also, excess fat in the waist area may affect risk more than the same amount of fat in the hips and thighs. Researchers believe that fat cells in various parts of the body have subtle differences in their metabolism that may explain this observation.
Studies of fat in the diet have not clearly shown that this is a breast cancer risk factor. Most studies found that breast cancer is less common in countries where the typical diet is low in total fat, low in polyunsaturated fat, and low in saturated fat.
On the other hand, many studies of women in the United States have not found breast cancer risk to be related to dietary fat intake. Researchers are still not sure how to explain this apparent disagreement. Many scientists note that studies comparing diet and breast cancer risk in different countries are complicated by other differences (such as activity level, intake of other nutrients, genetic factors) that might also alter breast cancer risk.
More research is needed to better understand the effect of the types of fat eaten and body weight on breast cancer risk. But it is clear that calories do count and fat is a major source of these. A diet high in fat has also been shown to influence the risk of developing several other types of cancer, and intake of certain types of fat is clearly related to heart disease risk. We recommend you maintain a healthy weight and limit your intake of red meats, especially those high in fat or processed.