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Smoking Men May Raise Risk To Offspring

LONDON, Nov. 18—Men who smoke could be damaging their sperm and increasing their children's risk of developing cancer, researchers said today.

A study by doctors at the University of Birmingham in England published in the British Journal of Cancer found that children whose fathers smoked more than 20 cigarettes a day had a 30 percent higher risk of developing cancer than other children.

The increased risk was not linked to smoking mothers and could not be explained by social class, family size or paternal age.

"Damaged sperm is the likeliest culprit," said Tom Sorahan, who led the research team.

"The findings fitted with other U.S. research showing that smoking damages a man's sperm. If the risk to children was a result of passive smoking, then we would have expected mothers' smoking to be at least as important as father's smoking, but it wasn't."

Sorahan and his team examined historical data over 40 years that looked at the smoking habits of mothers and fathers. It showed the cancer risk increased with the amount smoked.

The study was based on interviews with the parents of 2,567 children who died of cancer in Britain in 1971-1976 and an equal number of parents of healthy children.

It is the third study by the Birmingham team that looked at childhood cancer and parental smoking habits.

"In all of them we have no relation with the mother smoking, but a highly significant positive effect with the father smoking," he added.

Sorahan's finding are consistent with research in the United States by microbiologist Bruce Ames of the University of California at Berkeley that also found sperm damage in men who smoked.

Scientists believe smoking causes oxidation damage to sperm DNA, the carrier of genetic information.