It ’s probably not news to you that virus can make cancer . In fact , viruses have been entail insix dissimilar homo cancersso far , such as the well - known relationship between human papillomavirus infection and cervical Crab . Still , it arrive as a bit of a surprise when arecent studydrew a link between a cow computer virus and breast malignant neoplastic disease .
Now , no one is saying ( yet ) that this computer virus induce breast cancer ; this piece of work is very much in its babyhood and warrants further scrutiny . But if future , more in - profoundness study bolster these findings and deal to institute a causal function for this computer virus , then it could have significant entailment for breast cancer research and control , which presently focuses on intervention rather than prevention .
The virus in question is call bovine leukemia virus ( BLV ) , which happens to be the common cancer - causing computer virus of cattle . septic herds can be receive all across the globe , and in the U.S. it ’s been find in100%of heavy dairy farm cognitive process herds and almost 40 % of squawk herds . But despite its potential to cause disease , it only lead to cancer in around 5 % of those infected .
The virus preponderantly targets blood cells , but it can also infect mammary cells within the bag and consequently can be detect in cow ’s milk . Although pasteurisation render the virus harmless , scientists were worried that picture to food mathematical product could lead to human infection , but it was n’t until last year that astudywas published proving it could in reality be transmitted to human .
As described inPloS One , while they set up BLV DNA in 29 % of the normal controls , the pace was significantly high in tissue paper from charwoman with bosom cancer , detected in 59 % of the sample . Furthermore , they found that this seeming increased hazard in the likelihood of breast malignant neoplastic disease inflict by BLV was like to those of well - base risk of exposure factor , like certain lifestyle choices . The only factors that carried a importantly greater risk of exposure were genetic science , age and high doses of radiation therapy .
Now the tie-in has been identify , scientist demand to labour a bit deeply and look for possible contagion routes and evidence of a causal role , because at the moment we still ca n’t say this computer virus has the ability to cause chest cancer . But if it turns out it can , this could potentially be a good thing , as it may ultimately be potential to design preventive strategies like vaccines that could boil down breast cancer incidence .
