Aspirin 'helps protect against bowel cancer'

A daily aspirin tablet may help prevent bowel cancer, a study suggests.

Oxford University found it cut cases by a quarter and deaths by more than a third in a review of 14,000 patients.

Aspirins are already widely used to help protect people against strokes and heart problems, although many healthy middle-aged people do not take them because of the risk of side-effects.

But researchers said their findings - published by the Lancet - "tipped the balance" in favour of taking them.