Can Lycopene In Tomatoes Prevent Prostate Cancer?

It has now been almost 12 years since it was reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (Dec.6,1995:87:1767-76) that men who eat tomatoes at least twice a week have a lower risk of prostate cancer. It was Edward Giovannuci, MD, who examined the dietary habits and health of 47,894 male health care professionals and found that foods rich in tomato sauces appear to reduce the risk of prostate cancer.

“Researchers recently looked at all the literature and found a 20 percent reduced risk studies that looked at cooked, not raw, tomatoes,” says Harvard’s Giovannuci. Lycopene may explain why cooked tomatoes seem to be more protective than raw. “One serving of tomato sauce has much more lycopene than a fresh tomato or a glass of tomato juice,” says Giovannuci. Lycopene, the pigment that gives tomato, pink grapefruit, watermelon, and guava is also an antioxidant that’s concentrated in the prostate gland.

Other recent studies about the potentially preventive role of lycopene have been contradictory to the previous study of Giovannuci. Researchers at the National Cancer Institute and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, report that lycopene found in tomatoes, does not prevent prostate cancer. Study’s data were derived from 28,000 men enrolled in the prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarial (PLCO) Cancer Screening Trial, one of the largest study to evaluate the role of blood concentrations of lycopene in preventing prostate cancer.

“Our results do not offer support for the benefits of lycopene against prostate cancer,” said Ulrike Peters, Ph. D., of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.