New medical findings show that no sugar-added foods and drinks, therefore natural foods and juices, are the best way of preventing pancreatic cancer along with other severe insulin-related conditions. A recent 9-year follow-up study carried out by researchers at the Karolinska Institutet adds breakthrough information on how sugar affects the pancreas and the glucose metabolism, causing the organ to produce elevated amounts of insulin and triggering pancreatic cancer.

The study was an ample one, being run on about 80,000 men and women who had no health disorders at the beginning of the study, in 1997. Throughout the 9-year follow-up period, Karolinska Institute scientists closely watched the diets of subjects and after evaluating overall data in 2005, the team reached the conclusion that too much sugar in one's diet is one of the key-triggers of pancreatic cancer, one of the most lethal types of cancer.

At the end of the study, 131 subjects who enrolled back in 1997 as volunteers have died of pancreatic cancer, mostly due to the fact that they had an unhealthy diet which included sweetened foods and drinks, such as fizzy drinks, creamed fruit etc. Moreover, researchers cautioned that even adding sugar to one's cup of tea or coffee several times a day is harmful and may 'hurt' one's pancreas in time.

Susanna Larsson of the Karolinska Institute, one of the researchers involved in the study, stressed the fact that pancreatic cancer risk should be closely watched by both people and doctors, as this type of cancer cannot be easily diagnosed and is usually 'tracked down' too late. Moreover, there are no guaranteed or highly effective medical treatments to ease or reverse symptoms of pancreatic cancer.

"Despite the fact that the chances of developing pancreatic cancer are relatively small, it's important to learn more about the risk factors behind the disease. It is perhaps the most serious form of cancer, with very poor prognoses for its victims. Since it's difficult to treat and is often discovered too late, it's particularly important that we learn to prevent it."

According to the findings of the current study, those who are most at risk of developing pancreatic cancer are people who drink two or more fizzy drinks or syrup based drinks per day, with a 90% chance of becoming patients of the 'silent' type of cancer. Also, people who add sugar to their drinks or foods for at least 5 times a day are 70% more likely to develop pancreatic cancer symptoms, while those who eat creamed fruit have a 50% higher risk of becoming afflicted with the same appalling condition.

Commenting on the results of the current study, Henry Scowcroft, Science Information Officer at Cancer Research UK said that - despite decreasing rates of pancreatic cancer in the UK - people should pay increased attention to their diet and amounts of sugar they consume. He highlighted the fact that individuals' diets are not at all improving in this sense, on the contrary. The fact that statistics show that the number of pancreatic cancer patients has dropped lately is linked to more people giving up smoking, not to their healthier diets.

"The latest figures show that pancreatic cancer rates fell by five per cent between 1997 and 2003. But this is probably because more people are giving up smoking which is the major established cause of the disease. We know that a person's diet has a significant effect on their risk of several types of cancer including pancreatic cancer. This report highlights the need for further research to understand the specific effect of sugar intake on pancreatic cancer risk."