You may have to let that steaming hot tea, coffee or other beverages cool down a bit before you want to enjoy it. According to a new study published in the International Journal of Cancer, it has been found that drinking very hot tea could increase the risk of esophageal cancer.
Lead author of the study Dr. Farhad Islami from the American Cancer Society stated, “Many people enjoy drinking tea, coffee, or other hot beverages. However, according to our report, drinking very hot tea can increase the risk of esophageal cancer, and it is, therefore, advisable to wait until hot beverages cool down before drinking.”
For the study, Dr. Islami and his team supervised over 50,000 people, aged between 40 and 75 years old, for a period of 10 years. It was found during the analysis of a follow-up period that 317 out of total number of people had developed esophageal cancer. It is the cancer of tube connecting the throat and abdomen called esophagus. Almost 17,290 Americans were diagnosed with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) reports with this deadly form of disease last year, and merely 19 percent of patients could survive for five years.
The researchers found that consuming 700 ml or nearly three cups or more a day at a temperature of 140°F or more increased the risk of esophagus cancer by 90 percent, which is very high when compared with people who consumed the same amount of hot drink at a temperature of less than 140°F.
Drinking very hot beverages has been held responsible for increased risk of cancer even before. In the year 2016, the World Health Organization (WHO) delivered a report stating that drinking “extremely hot” drinks of any kind is likely to increase the cancer risk, and therefore classified as “probably carcinogenic” to individuals.
The study focused particularly on countries such as China, Iran, and South America, where tea is considered the bitter herbal infusion mate. It is traditionally consumed at extremely hot temperature i.e. more than 65 degrees or 70 degrees Celsius or (150 degrees or 160 degrees Fahrenheit).
Usually, in Europe and in the U.S, there is no tradition of drinking extremely hot beverages.
In 2018, another similar study in China, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, discovered that drinking steaming hot tea, smoking, and drinking alcohol at the same time was linked to an increased risk of squamous cell carcinoma of the esophagus.
While researchers believe in frequently drinking hot drinks may tend to have a persistent injury to the cell’s lining of the esophagus, experts have not recognized the underlying mechanism behind the cancer link.
A senior research associate at University College London, Dr. James Doidge told Science Media Centre, “It doesn’t take a scientist to appreciate that repeated irritation of anybody surface increases your risk of cancer. Sunburn gives us skin cancer, smoking gives us lung cancer, and many foods and drinks contribute to the risk of gastrointestinal cancers”. Science Media Centre is an independent association promoting the reporting of evidence-based technology. “If you enjoy your tea piping hot and we take the results on this study on face value, then we are talking about an additional lifetime risk of esophageal cancer of around one in one hundred for a lifetime of drinking hot tea. Not an insubstantial risk but one that should be balanced against the pleasure that you personally derive from your daily ritual,” Dr. Doidge said.
