What if your plate weighed almost as much as your tube of sunscreen in preventing sunburn?
skin cancer ? French and Chinese teams are starting to suggest it. By combining diet, biological aging and skin tumors, their work draws the same signal: certain dietary profiles would be significantly more exposed than others.
A large French cohort, E3N, and an American analysis published in 2026 in the journal Cancers converge towards the same type of diet: rich in plants, olive oil and antioxidants, poor in ultra-processed products. A model that closely resembles
Mediterranean dietwell known in France.
Mediterranean diet and skin cancers: figures from the E3N cohort
In the E3N study, 67,332 French women were followed until 2008. Their adherence to the Mediterranean diet was summarized by a score of 0 to 9, based on the consumption of fruits, vegetables, pulses, cereals, fish, olive oil, and the least amount of meat, dairy products and alcohol. During follow-up, 2,174 skin cancers were diagnosed, including 404 melanomas and 1,367 basal cell carcinomas.
Compared to women with the lowest score, those who followed this dietary pattern the most had a 17% reduced risk of skin cancers, with a reduction of 28% for melanoma and 23% for basal cell carcinoma. Each additional point in score came with about 4% less risk. “These results need to be confirmed in other populations, particularly in men and in countries with different food consumption. If these results are replicated, they could have an impact on primary prevention strategies for skin cancers.“, specified Yahya Mahamat-Saleh, epidemiologist and first author of this study.
Inflammation, antioxidants and biological age: what the study published in
Cancers
The US study used data from 16,628 adults from the NHANES program (2005–2018), 474 of whom reported a history of skin cancer. The researchers classified the diets using two scores: the Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) and the Dietary Oxidative Balance Score (DOBS). Participants on the most pro-inflammatory and pro-oxidant diet had an approximately 2.2 times higher risk of skin cancer than those on the most anti-inflammatory and antioxidant diet.
The authors also measured “phenotypic age” (PhenoAge), an indicator ofbiological age based on blood markers. A measure whose mechanism is consistent with both dietary assessment tools, as it integrates clinical biomarkers reflecting systemic inflammation and metabolic dysregulation. Each additional year of PhenoAge was linked to an increased risk of skin cancer.These findings provide a basis for developing hypotheses about the specific characteristics and mechanisms by which diet influences skin cancer, to be explored in future research. Given that skin cancer can significantly impair physical and psychological well-being, future research should prioritize strategies to systematically assess and consider multifactorial impacts, including the role of diet and biological aging.“, the authors wrote in the journal Cancers.
Concretely, what to eat to move towards a more protective profile?
Both studies remain observational and do not prove that a food “prevents” cancer. However, they agree on the same type of profile: rich in plants and good quality fats, poor in highly processed products. In practice, this often means favoring:
- Colorful fruits and vegetables, pulses and whole grains;
- Fish (especially fatty), nuts and seeds;
- Olive oil as main fat;
- Less red meat, ultra-processed products, added sugars and excess alcohol.
The authors also point out that the major risk factor for skin cancer remains exposure to UV rays. Phototype, family history and behavior in the sun weigh heavily, well beyond the plate. Adopting a more anti-inflammatory diet rich in antioxidants certainly appears to be an additional lever, but does not replace sun protection, nor regular monitoring of the skin, nor the advice of a dermatologist in case of doubt.