Food consumption of children and risk of childhood leukemia

The possible relationship between child’s early diet and risk of childhood leukemia has remained largely unexplored. The authors’ objective was to determine what particular foods consumed early in life (first two years) are associated with risk of childhood leukemia in a case-control study of a diverse California population. Dietary data were obtained by questionnaire administered to the child’s caregiver. Conditional logistic regression was used to analyze 328 case-control sets matched on age, sex, maternal race, and parental Hispanic status. Regular consumption of oranges/bananas (odds ratio (OR) = 0.49; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.26, 0.94) and orange juice (OR = 0.54; 95% CI = 0.31, 0.94) during the first two years of life was associated with a reduction in risk of childhood leukemia diagnosed between the ages of 2 to 14. Restricting the analysis to leukemia diagnosed between the ages of 2 to 5 reflected a similar pattern of reduced risk. No association between eating hotdogs/lunchmeats and risk of leukemia was found. These results suggest that fruits or fruit juices that contain vitamin C and/or potassium may reduce the risk of childhood leukemia, especially if consumed on a regular basis during the first two years of life.