Red wine’s new cancer boost

   The much-publicized idea that red wine can protect against cancer is given a boost this week through research that provides the notion with more scientific underpinning. Researchers at the University of Rochester have shown for the first time that resveratrol, a natural antioxidant found in grape skins and red wine, helps to destroy cancerous pancreatic cells by crippling the diseased cells’ mitochondria, the minute organelles found in the majority of living cells which provide them with energy reports the Financial Times.

The Rochester researchers found that resveratrol made tumor cells more sensitive to cancer-destroying radiation while rendering healthy cells less susceptible. Published in this month’s Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, their work suggests that a combination of red wine and conventional radiation or chemotherapy can be effective in killing cancer cells by crippling their mitochondria and so cutting off the cells’ supply of energy.

Paul Okunieff, head of radiation oncology at the university’s medical centre, said that although red wine consumption during conventional treatment had not been well studied it was not prohibited. He suggested the best approach was to let the patient drink as much red wine or purple grape juice as they wanted.