Unfiltered apple juice daily may prevent colon cancer

Researchers in Germany say that drinking two to three glasses of cloudy apple juice (unfiltered) per day may help keep colon cancer at bay. In a ten-week study using a mouse model for colon cancer, animals that were fed either cloudy apple juice or a potent extract of the juice showed a 38 percent and 40 percent reduction (respectively) in benign tumors of the small intestine, an indicator of its potential to fight colon cancer, in comparison to control animals that were given water instead of juice, according to Clarissa Gerhäuser, Ph.D., a researcher with the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. The anticancer effect is likely due to a potent class of antioxidants called procyanidins, the researcher says. A widely publicized recent study by a group of researchers in Poland found that cloudy apple juice also is richer in antioxidants — up to four times higher — than clear apple juice.