US study: Accidental ingestion of cadmium may cause breast cancer

The ugliest page in Taiwan's environmental history is the "cadmium rice incident" that occurred in the 1980s. At that time, many unscrupulous factories secretly discharged wastewater containing heavy metal elements into large irrigation drains, causing the downstream farmland to be seriously contaminated by cadmium. People who accidentally ate cadmium rice even developed "Itai-itai disease." Recent studies in the United States have shown that trace amounts of cadmium in many fertilizers can enter the human body through the food chain. Long-term accumulation is not only difficult to excrete from the body, but may also increase the risk of sudden breast cancer in menopausal women, so we must be careful.

Potatoes are the root crop that absorbs the most cadmium from fertilizers among all crops. (Photo/From Los Angeles Times)

The Los Angeles Times recently reported that humans get some "environmental hormones" from the surrounding environment every day. For example, potatoes, which Westerners eat almost every day, will absorb trace amounts of cadmium from the fertilizer during the planting process. If you eat too much, your body will easily get sick. The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) published a survey result showing that among 56,000 menopausal women, those who consumed relatively high amounts of cadmium in their diet had a 21% higher risk of developing breast cancer, and the proportion of those who developed endometrial cancer was also significantly higher.

Estrogen in women is an important hormone for maintaining sexual characteristics, but it is also a key substance that catalyzes specific cancer cells. Scientists have recently discovered that cadmium mimics the effects of estrogen in women, which is greater than the effects of any environmental hormone. Therefore, similar studies have pointed out that after excluding all possible factors, the accumulated cadmium in women's bodies will double the risk of developing breast cancer, which is indeed quite shocking.

Every year, 230,000 women in the United States are diagnosed with malignant breast cancer. Not only is the mortality rate high, but it is also increasing year by year. In addition to the known causes of the disease, many medical professionals have begun to highly suspect that trace amounts of heavy metals in fruits and vegetables may also be the main cause. However, reducing the intake of fruits and vegetables seems to be putting the cart before the horse. At present, the only way to solve the problem is to investigate the fertilizers used by farmers and remove the residual cadmium in them.