Alcohol found to increase risk of breast cancer

A major new study involving more than 300,000 female volunteers confirms a link between alcohol intake and breast cancer and finds that the risk increases with each additional daily drink.

Five Spanish universities and 334,850 women between the ages of 35 and 70 from ten European countries were involved in the research, which confirms previous evidence of a link between alcohol intake and breast cancer.

Over the course of the 11-year monitoring study, 11,576 participants were diagnosed with breast cancer.

The team found that "a woman's average risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer increases by 4% with each additional 10 grams/day of alcohol," according to Spanish scientist María Dolores Chirlaque.

The team also found that the longer a woman had been exposed to alcohol consumption, the greater a risk she had, especially if her alcohol intake had begun prior to her first pregnancy.