According to two new studies published March 20, 2012, taking aspirins every day may significantly reduce the risks of cancers and prevent tumors from spreading. One of the studies focused on tens of thousands of men and women from dozens of large, long-term Randomized Controlled trials conducted by the University of Oxford. As part of the study, the researchers, led by Dr. Peter Rothwell, found that three years after taking daily aspirin, the risk of developing cancers was reduced by almost 25 percent when compared to the control group of not taking aspirin. The same study found that the risk of dying of cancer after five years was 37 lower among those taking daily aspirin.
A second paper led by the same group of University of Oxford researchers found from five large RC trials that over the 6-and-1/2 years, the risk of metastatic cancer such as colorectal cancer was 36 percent lowers among the daily aspirin users when compared to nonusers. The risk of adenocarcinimas cancers such as colon, lung and prostate cancers was 46 percent lower among the daily aspirin users.
Both papers were published in the journal The Lancet.
A third paper, authored by Dr. Rothwell and his colleagues and published in the The Lancet Oncology, compared the findings of observational studies and randomized controlled studies of aspirin.
One of the concerns about the RC studies performed by the Oxford researchers is that they were not focused on cancer prevention. Instead they were focused on the effects of aspirin on prevention of heart disease. The Oxford researchers excluded two major U.S. studies, which could not prove the benefit of aspirin, as they involved taking aspirin every other day, instead of taking daily.
