Booze skin cancer risk

Scientists: One drink a day can raise chance of disease by 11%

JUST one alcoholic drink a day can increase your risk of skin cancer by 11%, scientists warn.

They blame a chemical called acetaldehyde, which damages DNA and is released when our bodies break down alcohol.

Dermatologist Dr Eunyoung Cho said: “This is an important finding given there are few ways to prevent skin cancer.” The team crunched numbers from 13 studies that included 95,241 nonmelanoma skin cancer cases.

They found an average of 10 grams of alcohol a day – a small wine or half a pint of beer – raised the risk of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma by 11% and basal cell carcinoma by 7%. The more people drank, the higher the risk.

Both carcinomas are common and, unlike rarer melanomas, are usually easy to treat. Dr Cho, of Brown University, Rhode Island, said: “Modifying alcohol behaviour may be a realistic intervention goal that can help substantially reduce the global non-melanoma skin cancer burden.”

At least 100,000 cases of skin cancer are diagnosed in the UK each year. The study is published in British Journal of Dermatology. The Red Arrows show off their famed pinpoint precision as three of the Hawk jets – and their vapour trails – line up perfectly.

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TIPPLE Drinking wine