Graduates face higher brain tumour risk

Paris: People with at least three years of higher education are at greater risk for cancerous brain tumours than those with no more than nine years of schooling, perplexed researchers said yesterday.

“There is a 19 per cent increased risk that university-educated men could be diagnosed with glioma,” said Amal Khanolkar, a scientist at the Institute of Child Health in London and lead author of a study in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community.

For women, he said, the risk rose by 23pc.

“It was a surprising result which is difficult to explain,” Khanolkar said. Concretely, the increase in risk is minimal because such brain tumours are rare. At the lowest level of education, the chances of glioma were reported at five in 3,000. At the other end of the educational spectrum, the odds increased to six in 3,000.