As a cancer scientist and someone interested in the ever-evolving relationship between science and the media, my eye was caught this week by the flashy headlines claiming that good-old tomatoes might just be the cure for gastric cancer. All the media fuss appears to stem from a paper accepted last week in the Journal Of Cell Physiology bearing the rather less exciting title : “Antitumoral Potential, Antioxidant Activity and Carotenoid Content of Two Southern Italy Tomato Cultivars”. As a fan of both cancer research and tomatoes, I felt the need to examine the evidence presented in the paper and whether they substantiate the Daily Mail claims.
