Smoking raises the risk of breast cancer for healthy-weight and
overweight women but not for those who are obese, new research
suggests. It’s a first-of-its-kind finding, and even if other
studies confirm it, it doesn’t mean that smoking is safe for
women who weigh way too much, researchers say. “Smoking is a
strong risk factor for many other diseases other than breast
cancer,” including lung cancer and heart disease, said Juhua
Luo, a West Virginia University scientist who led the study.
Obesity has long been recognized as a risk factor for breast
cancer, but research tying smoking to breast cancer is much
weaker. In March, Luo published results of a study that found a
16 percent higher risk of breast cancer among postmenopausal
women who smoke or used to smoke versus those who never did. The
76,628 women were in a government-funded, decades-long study
called the Women’s Health Initiative, and 3,378 breast cancer
cases occurred. Luo’s new study looks closer at these same women
according to body mass index, a