Cancer alert over vitamin E

Vitamin E can significantly increase the risk of men developing prostate cancer, a major study has shown.

The finding prompted a warning to men to be wary of taking vitamins and other health supplements.

Researchers, attempting to confirm reports that vitamin E and the mineral selenium could prevent prostate cancer, found instead that, in the case of vitamin E, the opposite was true.

Over several years of follow-up studies, it became clear that vitamin E in moderate doses raised the risk of prostate cancer by more than would be expected by chance.

Compared with a placebo, taking 400 international units (I-U) a day increased the rate of prostate cancer detection by 17 per cent.

The findings were reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.