So what caused that drop of 50 per cent in taking HRT? It seems this is what John Lee described as women ‘voting with their bodies’ rather than the medical profession prescribing less.

A study undertaken in 2009 at Stanford University in California found that women who take HRT for more than five years double their risk of suffering breast cancer for every 12 months they spend taking it. Breast cancer is the most common form of the disease diagnosed in women in Britain and one in nine women will develop the disease at some form in their life. More than 45,000 cases are diagnosed every year and about 15,000 women die from the cancer, although survival rates have increased significantly in recent years.

However, the good news is that within a year of stopping HRT the risk of developing breast cancer was almost back to normal. This was not a small scale study either, unlike the original research on HRT, as more than 57,0000 women were studied which enabled the research team to say conclusively that there was very strong evidence that HRT causes breast cancer.

Food scientists Dr. Susanne and Steve Talcott undertook a study at Texam A&M University on five varieties of mangos that are most common in the USA. Kent, Francine, Ataulfo, Tommy/Atkins and Haden, in case you are interested, and they specifically tested polyphenol extracts from the fruit on colon, breast, lung, leukaemia and prostate cancer cells.

Polyphenols are natural substances in plants that are antioxidants with the potential to protect the body from disease and this research focused on polyphenolic compounds in mangos known as gallotannins, a class of natural bioactive compounds believed to help prevent or block the growth of cancer cells.

The results are encouraging as the mango extract demonstrated some cancer fighting ability when tested on lung, leukaemia and prostate cancer cells, but really were impressive when tested on the most common breast and colon cancers where they were found cause cancer cells to undergo apoptosis, or programmed cell death.

The researchers documented that the division process cancer cells go through was interrupted by mango extract. This is crucial information, for cells that may be on the verge of mutating or being damaged, mango polyphenolics could prevent this and so prevent cancer.

The scientists have conducted additional research on the colon cancer cell lines because mangos contain small molecules that are readily absorbed in the colon as well as larger molecules that are not absorbed and remain present longer in the colon. That could potentially make eating mangos a potent way to help prevent colon cancer.

Time to add mangos to one of your five a day?

This research has emerged because of the increase seen in traumatic brain injury among combat casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is estimated that as many as 30 percent of wounded soldiers have suffered such injury and it has stimulated government interest in developing a safe and effective treatment for this complex disorder.

It seems there is growing evidence to indicate that administering progesterone after such injuries can have beneficial effects, including substantial and sustained improvements in brain function. This applies equally to men and women, as progesterone can cross the blood-brain barrier and reduce the level of swelling after a brain injury, it also significantly reduces the area of necrotic cell death and improves behavioural outcomes.

Natural progesterone was recently tested in two clinical trials for traumatic brain injury and will begin a phase 3 trial soon. The researchers concluded that given its relatively high safety profile, ease of administration, low cost and ready availability, then progesterone should be considered a viable treatment option, particularly as there is little other treatment available to brain injury patients.