Day 256 - 04 Jun 96 - Page 43
1
2 Q. "As already mentioned, fat intake in rural China is
3 exceptionally low when compared with Western experience.
4 In addition to its correlation with plasma cholesterol, fat
5 intake was also correlated weakly but significantly with"
6 -- and you give the figure for the correlation -- "breast
7 cancer."
8
9 Then you go on: "However, Chinese women, when compared
10 with British women for example, exhibited later age at
11 menarche, earlier age at menopause, greater parity, earlier
12 age at first birth, and lower circulating concentrations of
13 estrogen, all of which favour a reduction in breast
14 cancer."
15 A. Right.
16
17 Q. Is it your view that all of those factors favour a
18 reduction in breast cancer?
19 A. Yes -- each of which are, in turn, influenced by
20 dietary fat intake.
21
22 Q. By -----
23 A. By dietary fat intake or each of which are influenced
24 by, let us say, high fat diets or increasing levels of fat.
25
26 Q. Why does greater parity or earlier age at first birth
27 derive itself from any kind of a dietary factor?
28 A. I am sorry, I did miss that.
29
30 Q. There are two there at least, are there not, greater parity
31 and earlier age at first birth?
32 A. I am sorry, I was thinking of the age at menarche,
33 early age of menopause and circulating levels of estrogen.
34 Some of them made some connection with parity and first
35 pregnancy, but were rather tenuous.
36
37 Q. Exactly. Those two, most people in the scientific
38 community would agree, are they not, Professor Campbell,
39 social considerations: the number of children you have and
40 the age at which you first have them?
41 A. Yes.
42
43 Q. Now -----
44 A. But can I add a point here? That is true, your
45 question, my answer; but they, amongst those five, are the
46 lesser -- are the factors of lesser significance than, for
47 example, age of menarche and age of menopause, and
48 circulating estrogen levels. Those three, which are
49 connected to diet, are easily the most consistently found
50 to be of significant associations.
51
52 Q. There is another dietary factor which I am not -- this is
53 not a criticism, because it does not fit into the order of
54 your text here -- but there is another factor as well which
55 you would, I think, say accounted for perhaps a lower rate
56 of breast cancer in Chinese women, and that is that they
57 eat more plants?
58 A. Yes.
59
60 Q. If all those things be taken into account, the correlation
