Redefining the Approach to Breast Cancer Prevention

This Pink October, consider that good health and prevention from disease may be as simple – and as profound – as your next meal.

“Eat your vegetables, child!” Who doesn’t remember Mom’s or Grandma’s stern admonition at the dinner table when you pushed your carrots or spinach around the plate? Turns out that beyond watching the food budget, they also tried laying the foundation for lifelong healthy eating habits. Plant-based nutrition plays a key role in reducing the risk for numerous illnesses, including cancer. So when in October the pink ribbons for breast cancer awareness once again sprout all around you, the most powerful preventive weapon against it may already be sitting in your shopping basket. 

By now, it is no longer new news: numerous independent studies over the past two decades have shown that consuming more healthful plant-based foods like whole grains, fruits, and vegetables is associated with significantly lower breast cancer risk. While conventional medicine focuses on early detection and treatment, nutritional medicine offers something more powerful: the possibility that many women need never face breast cancer at all. And France, with its year-round abundance of produce from Normandy apples to Provençal eggplants, from Brittany’s root vegetables to Alsatian stone fruits, should be well positioned to ensure its citizens’ health and wellbeing.

Yet, the statistics speak a different language and are quite alarming: The French National Cancer Institute (INCa)’s statistics show that 61,214 new cases of breast cancer were diagnosed in metropolitan France in 2023, with nearly 80% occurring in individuals aged 50 and over. More disturbing still: France holds the highest breast cancer incidence rate globally, with cases increasing by 0.8% annually overall and by 2.1% annually among young women. It is worth noting that while women constitute the overwhelming majority of cases, men can also be afflicted by the disease.

The French Paradox Reimagined

Strangely enough, the country that gave us sophisticated culinary traditions also leads global breast cancer statistics, a fact that recent studies suggests may not be coincidental. Research identifies five staples of French cuisine as the culprits likely to increase the risk: dairy products, red meat, deep fried food, sugar, and alcohol. Of course, this refers not exclusively to France but to a typical Western style diet in general, but the facts are (literally) on the table, and they speak a clear language. For a nation where café au lait remains a sacred morning ritual, where a classic steak frites lunch is invariably washed down with a nice Burgundy and followed by a crème brûlée, this represents more than dietary adjustment: it demands cultural reconsideration. 

Food matters. So does education.

Rodrigo Cardoso, founder of De la Science à l’Assiette (From Science to Plate) and based in Besançon, has been quietly building this reconsideration across French cities. His workshops, drawing from his certifications as a Plant-Based Nutrition Professional by the T. Colin Campbell Center for Nutrition Studies and as an instructor in the “Manger pour Vivre” programme certified by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) translate international nutritional research into French culinary practice.

The worldwide programme, supported by PCRM, teaches a nutrition-based approach to prevent and reduce chronic illnesses related to food intake. “Everyone agrees with the expression ‘We are what we eat,’ but few truly understand it,” Rodrigo says. “The Science to Plate workshops bring this awareness to you by connecting scientific research with practical cooking.”

While his non-profit organization educates throughout the year, Octobre Rose is the month for Rodrigo to train the spotlight on PCRM’s international “Let’s Beat Breast Cancer” campaign with a batucada on October 18 in Besançon. The colourful Brazilian style street event seeks to engage in discussions and to alert to this connection between breast cancer and the great benefactress that is Mother Nature… an event so successful in its inaugural 2024 edition that it can only be hoped that it will travel to other locations in the years to come.  

The Antioxidant Arsenal

The mechanism behind plant-based protection lies in the molecular realm. Antioxidants found in fruits and vegetables actively reduce DNA damage in breast cells, the cellular foundation of cancer development. Eating your greens is therefore biochemical warfare fought at the subcellular level, with every serving of vegetables representing reinforcement for the body’s natural defense systems. Plant-based diets regulate insulin levels, improve glucose management, and maintain healthier blood lipid profiles – all factors that significantly reduce breast cancer risk.

The Path Forward

Conventional medicine focuses on early detection and treatment, but nutritional medicine offers something even more powerful: the possibility that many women may never have to face breast cancer at all. Perhaps the solution to a healthier lifestyle lies not in pharmaceutical innovation, but in agricultural wisdom… and not in what we add to our plates, but in what we choose to remove.

All images courtesy De la Science à l’Assiette unless otherwise credited

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