Daily aspirin and cancer

Regular aspirin may not only protect your heart. It may also reduce your risks of cancer. Asitya Bardia and colleagues from the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, USA analysed the cancer history of more than 22 000 post-menopausal women over a period of 12 years. Those women who reported taking aspirin regularly at the start of the study were 16% less likely to develop cancer and 13% less likely to die of it during the period of the study.

The only lifestyle factor that influenced the results was smoking, which reduced the positive effect slightly. Bardia suggests that aspirin's anti-inflammatory effects may be responsible, although a similar effect was not seen with other anti-inflammatories, such as ibuprofen.