Red Wine 'Could Prevent Breast Cancer Developing Further'

A component of red wine may prevent breast cancer cell growth and can against the resistant forms of the disease to fight, research suggests.

Resveratrol, a plant chemical found in grapes and red wine, blocks the effects of estrogen delivery of cancer, studies have shown. It can also inhibit the growth of breast cancer cells are resistant to the hormones, scientists say.

This could have important implications for women whose tumors do not respond to hormonal treatments like tamoxifen on.

Hormone-sensitive tumors, the majority of breast cancers.

It can often be treated through surgery and hormone treatments. But in about half of all cases, the cancer develops resistance and begins to spread.

Scientists in Italy have different cell lines of breast cancer, including some that were resistant to therapy used to test the effects of resveratrol. They found that exposure to the chemical resulted in a significant reduction of cell growth.

"Resveratrol is a potential drug to be used when breast cancer to be resistant to hormone therapy," said study leader Dr. Sebastanio Ando, University of Calabria. The results are published in the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology Journal.

Dr. Gerald Weissmann, editor, said: "These results are very interesting, but it does not mean that people go and start with red wine or resveratrol supplements for the treatment of breast cancer What this means is that a paradise for scientists. 't over yet distilling the secrets of good health, which were hidden in the natural products such as red wine. "