Excluding two important dietary compounds from your meals could have serious implications
Scientists have issued a warning as a popular diet could be linked to one of the UK’s most deadly cancers. A new study has revealed that cutting out carbohydrates and fibre could put you at greater risk of bowel cancer.
This is thought to be due the impact it has on bacteria in the gut. More specifically, the study showed that a type of a bacteria group called Escherichia coli (E. coli) is negatively affected by low carb diets.
Researchers noted that it increased the development of polyps – an abnormal growth of tissue. And some polyps have the potential to develop into bowel cancer.
The findings, which were published in the journal Nature Microbiology, come amid a worrying rise in bowel cancer cases in young people. Last year it was revealed that bowel cancer rates are rising quickest among the under 50s in 27 out of 50 countries, including England.
England experienced the fourth fastest rise in the rate of early-onset bowel cancer in the decade to 2017, faster than any other country in Europe and behind only New Zealand, Chile and Puerto Rico. On top of this, bowel cancer is already the fourth most common type of cancer in the UK, accounting for 44,100 new cases every year.
There are thought to be many factors that can affect your risk of developing bowel cancer, with your diet being one of them. Processed foods and meat have been previously linked to the disease.
With this in mind, the team from the University of Toronto in Canada sought to establish if there was a connection between specific diet types combined with certain types of bacteria. They used mice as subjects and fed them either low-carb and low-fibre diets, normal chow diets, or Western-style diets, which were high in fat and sugar.
The mice were checked for polyps at the start and 16 weeks in. As reported by Medical News Today, only the combination of the low-carb diet and E. coli showed the potential to increase the risk of colorectal cancer.
Study authors noted this as significant since E. coli is present in 60 per cent of colorectal cancer cases. Mice eating this diet who also had E. coli bacteria had a higher number of polyps and tumours.
On top of this, they also displayed DNA damage and other markers that lead to a higher risk of developing bowel cancer. It was found that the low-carb diet thinned the mucus layer in the colon that protects against microbes
However, researchers found that adding fibre to these mice’s diets reduced the formation of tumours and helped control inflammation. It is now their aim to look into what types of fibre are more protective and if this is the case in humans.
Low-carbohydrate diets have long been a staple in diet culture, with the Atkins diet gaining widespread popularity in the early 2000s. In more recent years, the carnivore diet – which includes only animal products and is therefore extremely low in fibre and carbs – has faced criticism from some health experts.
Cancer Research UK says you can lower your risk of bowel cancer by:
- Upping your fibre intake
- Lowering your intake of red and processed meat
- Maintaining a healthy weight
- Regularly exercising
- Not smoking
- Limiting your alcohol intake
- Knowing your family history of the disease.