Breastfeeding cuts cancer risk

Breast cancer in the western world could be more than halved if women breastfed their babies for longer, according to research today.

More than 1,000 women a year in the UK alone could be prevented from developing the disease if they breastfed their children for an extra six months, research by British scientists published in The Lancet has shown.

It has been known for some time that having children can reduce the risk of the disease, but today's study shows that breastfeeding plays a major part in protecting against it.

Scientists now hope to be able to develop drugs which will replicate the preventative effect of breastfeeding. The UK has one of the highest rates of breast cancer in Europe, and the lowest levels of breastfeeding.

Scientists from Cancer Research UK looked at 47 separate studies in 30 different countries, involving 50,000 women who had developed breast cancer and 100,000 who did not have the disease.

They found that for every year a woman breastfeeds, her risk of breast cancer goes down by 4.3 per cent, on top of the 7 per cent reduction for each child she has.

Women from the developing world were found to breastfeed for an average of two years per child and have six or seven children.

In the West, women breastfeed for only two or three months per child and have two or three children.