New study below [1].
From 1992:
The European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition [EPIC] study "is being carried out in seven European countries and it will collect data on diet, other lifestyle and environmental factors, anthropometry as well as biological samples in a cohort of about 400,000 healthy European adults. The subjects will be followed up to investigate the incidence of and mortality from cancer in relation to epidemiological data and biochemical markers."
EPIC has generated almost a thousand papers. The sort of boondoggle, perhaps, that gives the European Union a bad reputation. The author of the 1992 paper was Elio Riboli and, 27 years later, his name is on the current paper too.
There is an assumption in many PCa papers that saturated fat must contribute to PCa initiation or progression, or both. There are a dozen potential reasons why a 16 oz porterhouse steak twice a week night be inadvisable, but some researchers go straight to stearic acid. After all, the stearic acid in beef tallow causes heart attacks, doesn't it? Didn't Wendy's fry their fries in beef fat? & didn't Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendey's die young from a heart attack? He did have a heart attack, but liver cancer killed him at 69. OK, James Near, Chairman of Wendy's, did die of a heart attack at 58.
Anecdotes aside, after many years of public abuse stearic acid was exonerated a while back (cardiovascular-neutral). But 60+ years of anti-saturated fat propaganda has left its mark & many in the U.S. try to avoid fat of all kinds. & more so after a PCa diagnosis, it seems. I've never heard a newly-diagnosed guy say "I must eat more fat."
There are more than 7 countries here: U.K. (soon to depart - that will improve the stats, LOL), France, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden & Norway.
142,239 men - 142,239 dietary questionnaires - 13.9 years of follow-up, 7,036 prostate cancer cases and 936 prostate cancer deaths.
"Intakes of individual fatty acids were not related to overall prostate cancer risk."
"However, a higher intake of butyric acid might be associated with a higher risk of advanced".
"might be"? Cheese or butter? This is important - I can't give up butter.
"There were no associations with fatal prostate cancer, with the exception of a slightly higher risk for those who consumed more eicosenoic acid ... and eicosapentaenoic acid". Eicosapentaenoic acid [EPA] is the healthy fish oil we are all trying to get more of - but they did say only "slightly".
It seems to me that the dietary patterns of the countries listed above are quite diverse, & it would be nice to see the data by country. Is oleic acid (primarily from olive oil) protective? We aren't going to learn much by commingling Greek & Swedish data, Spanish & Dutch data.
While olive oil is an important cooking oil, most of the fatty acids estimated from the questionnaires are components of food. Difficult to analyze EPA risk without accounting for sources. Maybe EPA from a nice grilled herring is protective, but from fast-food fried fish not. But then one is on the slippery path to defining "healthy" & "unhealthy" eating patterns.
Lots more work to do for those EPIC statisticians. Many more papers to come.
-Patrick
{P.S. I added a few more words for J-O-H-N!}
