Drinking too hot coffee or tea may increase the risk of esophageal cancer, a study has found.
- According to the cancer-environment.fr website, cancer of the esophagus is linked to several risk factors: alcohol, tobacco, underweight, overweight or even diseases causing lesions of the esophagus and genetic factors.
- In France, for the year 2018, the estimated number of new cases of esophageal cancer was 5,445 and the estimated number of deaths from esophageal cancer was 3,725.
Do you like it particularly hot? Be careful, because according to a study published in the journal Clinical Nutritiondrinking coffee, tea or any other beverage at high temperature can increase the risk of developing esophageal cancer.
Tissue damage
To arrive at this conclusion, researchers at the University of Cambridge compared the genetic data of more than 580,000 people in Finland and the United Kingdom, over a period of 11 years, noting first that coffee drinkers had more of cancers than non-drinkers. Then, after having questioned them about their drinking habits, they observed that drinking hot or even very hot coffee or tea increased by three or four the risk of cancer of the throat and esophagus. The study does not specify the number of cups drunk in question.
Coffee would not be responsible in itself: it is the burns of the tissues of the food pipe, caused by the passage of a hot drink, which increase the risks. “The most likely reason for the association between coffee consumption and esophageal cancer is damage from hot liquid poured down the throat.” explains Dr. Stephan Burgess, one of the authors of the study, in a communicated. “It appears to be a thermal injury rather than something specific to coffee or caffeine.”
4.1 times more risk
In detail, the hotter the drink, the greater the risk. coffee drinkers “very hot” are thus 4.1 times more likely to have esophageal cancer, compared to 2.7 times among infusion consumers “lukewarm”. It is therefore advisable, by the authors of the study, to wait until the drinks cool down a little before drinking them. This is not the first time that such an observation has been made by the scientific community, the proof with this 2019 study.
In 2016, the International Agency for Research on Cancer, which is the cancer agency of the World Health Organization (WHO), classified very hot drinks over 65°C as potentially carcinogenic substances, same as alcohol and tobacco.
