Introduction

A major scientific challenge for the next decades is to understand the interplay between genetic susceptibility and environmental factors in aetiology of chronic diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases and diabetes. Genetic susceptibility contributes to the occurrence of these diseases, and it is now thought that many common gene variants (each with a subtle effect of their own) together modify the risk of these diseases. Besides genetic factors, lifestyle factors such as physical activity and diet substantially influence incidence of these chronic

diseases. This is convincingly illustrated inmigration studies. These studies have shown that the risk of chronic diseases for people migrating to western countries resemble the incidence rates of their hosting countries within one or two generations. However, the influence of genetic factors and their interaction with environment on the occurrence of chronic diseases remains to be established. The European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) was initiated to address these questions. EPIC-NL is the Dutch contribution to this collaboration.

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Cardiovascular consequences of famine in the young

Among women from the Prospect-EPIC cohort, who had been exposed to the 1944-45 Dutch famine when they were aged between 0-21 years, a higher coronary heart disease and lower stroke risk was found compared with unexposed women. the investigators conclude that exposure to undernutrition during postnatal perdiods of development may affect cardiovascular health in adult life. See abstract.

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