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EPIC<br />
European Prospective Investigation<br />
into <strong>Cancer</strong>, Chronic Diseases,<br />
Nutrition and Lifestyle<br />
Problem<br />
There are a series of complex relationships between a) the<br />
consumption of major foods and alcoholic beverages by different<br />
European populations, and b) the anthropometric<br />
characteristics and physical activity (PA) levels of diff erent<br />
European populations and the causation/prevention of<br />
diff erent cancers, coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke.<br />
Aim<br />
Keywords | Diet | lifestyle | physical activity | coronary heart disease (CHD) | stroke | chronic disease |<br />
The objective of this action is to reinforce and expand the<br />
collaboration between 27 European institutions so as to<br />
ensure that there is a major European resource containing:<br />
• a very large database of 521 000 European subjects<br />
from ten European countries who provided detailed<br />
information on diet, lifestyle and health status between<br />
1992 and 1999;<br />
• a bio-repository of blood samples collected at baseline<br />
and stores in liquid nitrogen;<br />
• follow-up data on over 28 000 cancer cases diagnosed<br />
after baseline, and over 15 500 deaths from all causes.<br />
This will produce a large mass of data relevant for the identifi<br />
cation of nutritional and environmental causes of cancer<br />
and other chronic diseases, and this knowledge will contribute<br />
to the development of eff ective public health strategies<br />
for the prevention of cancer, CHD and stroke.<br />
This will also enhance the development of statistical methods<br />
for multicentre, Europe-wide studies on diet and chronic<br />
disease.<br />
Expected results<br />
New scientifi c knowledge will be gained on the roles that<br />
diet, obesity, physical activity, alcohol, tobacco and socioeconomic<br />
factors play in the risk of developing cancer,<br />
coronary heart disease and stroke in the ten European countries<br />
studied. This will include:<br />
• a greater understanding of the complex relationships<br />
between these health outcomes, and diet and alcoholic<br />
beverage intake;<br />
• updated results on the health-damaging eff ects of<br />
tobacco and the benefi ts of quitting tobacco;<br />
• the identifi cation of long-term disease risk prediction of<br />
biomarkers of diet, aiming to identify new biomarkers<br />
for the identifi cation of subjects at increased cancer<br />
risk due to nutritional imbalances;<br />
• methodological guidelines on quality/standardised methods<br />
for measuring diet and PA.<br />
Scientifi c reports and papers will be published.<br />
Potential applications<br />
Recommendations for public health policies on strategies<br />
for the prevention of cancer, CHD and stroke in Europe,<br />
through the improvement of dietary habits and the promotion<br />
of a healthy lifestyle.<br />
98 CANCER RESEARCH PROJECTS FUNDED UNDER THE SIXTH FRAMEWORK PROGRAMME