Exploring Possibility Latina Women Have Lower Risk Of Developing Breast Cancer Than Americans
In Mexico, breast cancer has been adequately controlled, and is no longer considered a risk of death when it’s diagnosed. The disease is common among women in the capital and the northern states, it ranks first in incidence of malignant neoplasms in females. Representing 11.34 percent of all cancer cases, and there is an overall increase of about a 1.5 per year.
However, in the United States this increase is of five percent per year. In response, a group of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco, presented in the framework of the 51st annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) a study which reveals that there is a common gene variant among Hispanic women that reduces the risk of developing breast cancer.
The study showed that one in five Latin American women have this variant known as single nucleotide polymorphism or genetic alteration (SNP) found on chromosome 6q25.
It also identified that one in five Latina women in the US has this genetic variant. Although its function is not yet known, is believed to affect the production of estrogen.
This research scientifically proved that Hispanic-Latino women have a lower rate of breast cancer compared with the US women.
Basic biology is still unable to resolve the association between variant in chromosome 6q25 and reduction of breast cancer, but preliminary trials indicate that affects transcription factors, such as proteins that regulate the expression of an estrogen receptor, according to Dr. Jean René Clemenceau Valdivia oncologist at a Hospital in Mexico City and member of the ASCO.
Also, the Cancer Center of the University of Arizona in collaboration with the universities of Texas in the United States and Sonora and Guadalajara in Mexico, noted similar characteristics between populations of Mexican and Mexican-American women. They found that for every five kilograms of weight a woman gains, a decrease of eight percent in the risk of developing breast is obtained in Mexican and Mexican-American women.
Source: Agencia ID