Sep 17, 2026 02:25 PM
https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-...re-cancer/
INTRO: Researchers at the University of Oxford analysed data from 977, 282 adults taking part in the UK Biobank and Million Women Study. The participants reported whether they generally drank hot beverages “warm,” “hot” or “very hot.” Researchers then followed their health records for more than a decade.
Over that period, 2,348 participants developed esophageal cancer, which affects the muscular tube carrying food and drink from the mouth to the stomach.
There was a striking difference when researchers separated those cancers by type. People who preferred “very hot” drinks had 3.17 times the risk of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, or SCC, compared with people who preferred warm drinks. Those who preferred drinks simply “hot” also faced a higher risk, though the increase was smaller.
The second major type, adenocarcinoma, showed no comparable relationship with drink temperature. This suggests that it’s not an ingredient in tea or coffee (in which case you’d expect a broader pattern). Instead, the association concentrated on the cancer arising directly in cells exposed to the passing liquid.
It’s not the first study to look at very hot drinks and esophageal cancer. In fact, such studies have been carried out for decades, particularly in parts of South America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East where tea or maté may traditionally be consumed at very high temperatures... (MORE - details)
PAPER: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.70654
INTRO: Researchers at the University of Oxford analysed data from 977, 282 adults taking part in the UK Biobank and Million Women Study. The participants reported whether they generally drank hot beverages “warm,” “hot” or “very hot.” Researchers then followed their health records for more than a decade.
Over that period, 2,348 participants developed esophageal cancer, which affects the muscular tube carrying food and drink from the mouth to the stomach.
There was a striking difference when researchers separated those cancers by type. People who preferred “very hot” drinks had 3.17 times the risk of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, or SCC, compared with people who preferred warm drinks. Those who preferred drinks simply “hot” also faced a higher risk, though the increase was smaller.
The second major type, adenocarcinoma, showed no comparable relationship with drink temperature. This suggests that it’s not an ingredient in tea or coffee (in which case you’d expect a broader pattern). Instead, the association concentrated on the cancer arising directly in cells exposed to the passing liquid.
It’s not the first study to look at very hot drinks and esophageal cancer. In fact, such studies have been carried out for decades, particularly in parts of South America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East where tea or maté may traditionally be consumed at very high temperatures... (MORE - details)
PAPER: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.70654