An infection passed during sex may cause prostate cancer
Fresh research out of the University of California has identified a possible cause of prostate cancer
A common infection passed during sexual intercourse has been found to accelerate cancer growth. Image by Thinkstock
A common infection passed on during sex may be the cause of prostate cancer, which affects 30 per cent of all cancer sufferers in Australia, scientists say.
Trichomoniasis, believed to the most common non-viral sexually transmitted infection with 276 million people infected, has been found by University of California scientists to aid cancer growth in human prostate cells under lab conditions.
Although several cancers are caused by infections, Cancer Research UKsays it is too early to add prostate cancer to this list.
The tentative link was first revealed in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)
This latest research is not the first to suggest a link between trichomoniasis and prostate cancer. A study in 2009 found a quarter of men with prostate cancer showed signs of trichomoniasis, and these men were more likely to have advanced tumours.
Study author Prof Patricia Johnson and colleagues found the parasite that causes trichomoniasis - Trichomonas vaginalis - secretes a protein that causes inflammation and increased growth and invasion of benign and cancerous prostate cells.
It’s been a big week in prostate cancer news with dogs found to be more capable at detecting prostate cancer than current methods.
With near-perfect accuracy, rigorously trained German shepherds demonstrated that they were able to identify the presence of the disease by smelling volatile organic compounds released into urine by prostate tumors, according to the results of a study presented during the 2014 Annual Meeting of the American Urological Association (AUA) in Orlando, Florida.
Comparing with other cancers in Australia, prostate cancer has one of the highest five-year survival rates of 92% after diagnosis.
