Very hot drinks probably cancer risk: ICAR
16 Jun 2016
Very hot drinks probably upped cancer risk, a UN agency said yesterday, but coffee once suspected to be a carcinogen - is safe if enjoyed at 'normal' temperatures.
Tea and mate, a popular South American herbal infusion, might be harmful if drunk hotter than 65 degrees Celsius (150 degrees Fahrenheit), according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).
"It doesn't matter what the liquid is," said epidemiologist Dana Loomis, who took part in a review of the world's most popular hot beverages, AFP reported. "What matters is the temperature," she added.
With over 1.1 billion cups of coffee consumed around the world daily, the industry welcomed the beverage's removal from the list of "possibly cancerogenic" substances.
"Today we can brew or buy a cup with even more confidence thanks to science," said Bill Murray, president of the US-based National Coffee Association.
According to the Institute for Scientific Information on Coffee, which closely tracked research in the field, coffee was typically consumed below 60°C.
"IARC's assessment on very hot beverages is therefore not associated with normal coffee consumption," secretary general Roel Vaessen said in a statement.
The IARC reviewed around 1,000 studies that investigated a connection between high-temperature beverages and their potential link to cancer.
On the basis of available evidence, they concluded that drinking very hot beverages, which they defined as anything above 149°F (65°C) - cooler than a cup of coffee available at most take-out spots carried higher risk of cancer of the esophagus.
Animal studies also seemed to suggest that even very hot water could up the risk of this type of cancer, presumably because the temperature scalded the delicate tissues in the esophagus; that damage might then trigger more rapid turnover of the cells, which could in some cases lead to out-of-control malignant growth.
