Dietary fat and human cancer (review)

Although there is good evidence that dietary factors, especially the amounts of fats, are important in the causation of many human cancers there is no concensus on the role of dietary fat in the causation of cancer at any site. An outline is given of the methods available for the study of such a relationship, together with some of their shortcomings and relative strengths. This is followed by a review of the evidence that dietary fat is an important etiological agent in the causation of cancers of the large bowel, breast, endometrium, prostate and in protection against cancer of the stomach.