EATING a slightly green banana each day could help prevent cancer in those with a family history of the disease, scientists have found.
The team at Newcastle and Leeds Universities examined 1,000 people with Lynch syndrome, a genetic condition that increases your risk of certain cancers including bowel, ovary, stomach, womb and pancreatic.
Eating a slightly green banana each day could help prevent cancer
They found a regular daily dose of resistant starch supplement – the equivalent of one green banana – over two years reduced some cancers by up to two thirds.
While it didn’t affect bowel cancer, it did reduce a person’s risk of gastrointestinal ones.
Resistant starch, also found in oats, and beans, isn’t digested in the small intestine.
Instead, it ferments in your large intestine, feeding good bacteria.
Professor John Mathers of Newcastle University, said: “We found resistant starch reduces a range of cancers by over 60 per cent.
“The effect was most obvious in the upper part of the gut.”