title: Promoting effect of beer and ethanol on anti-tumour cytotoxicity: unaffected growth of a transplantable rat tumour.
abstract: The effects of beer and alcohol (4.8% ethanol v/v) were studied on (i) the growth of a syngeneic colonic carcinoma transplantable in male D/A rats, (ii) levels of blood B and T-lymphocyte classes, (iii) antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC), and (iv) direct lymphocyte anti-tumour cytotoxicity. Beer and alcohol had no effect on tumour growth, but led to significant increases in non-specific anti-tumour cytotoxicity in the levels of blood lymphocytes labelled by the monoclonal antibody OX/8 (cytotoxic/suppressor cells) and in the levels of total T-lymphocytes; ADCC was not affected. It is concluded that alcohol stimulates non-specific cell-mediated immunity (CMI) but that it either does not affect tumour growth or that the increased CMI is compensatory for a tumour-growth stimulatory effect of alcohol.
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001515:Beer; D003110:Colonic Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy; D003602:Cytotoxicity, Immunologic / Q000187:drug effects*; D000431:Ethanol / Q000494:pharmacology*; D007694:Killer Cells, Natural / Q000187:drug effects; D008297:Male; D009374:Neoplasms, Experimental / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000276:immunology; D051381:Rats; D011919:Rats, Inbred Strains; D013602:T-Lymphocytes, Cytotoxic / Q000187:drug effects; D050378:T-Lymphocytes, Regulatory / Q000187:drug effects
chemical_list: D000431:Ethanol