Longer usage of common drug halves risk of breast cancer deaths

Death rates from the most common type of breast cancer can be slashed by taking a drug for 10 years rather than the recommended five, a study suggests.

Women with oestrogen receptor positive breast cancer who take tamoxifen for a decade halve their risk of dying from the disease, according to research presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology conference in Chicago.

The Cancer Research UK report, called the ATTom study, looked at nearly 7,000 women with breast cancer who, after five years of taking tamoxifen, either continued taking the drug for another five years or stopped treatment. Among women who took tamoxifen for 10 years, 25% fewer had recurrences of breast cancer and 23% fewer died, compared to women who took the drug for just five years.