The burning incense creates a pleasant scent. The incense has been used in many religious and spiritual ceremonies from a lot of cultures for millennia . For example, in Asia, people use to burn incense in their homes and this has become very popular for Western countries.

Still, no matter how sweet may be the scent of the incense, researchers have reported on Monday that inhaling the smoke regularly could increase people’s risks of cancer of the respiratory tract.

The study was made on more than 61,000 Chinese living in Singapore. They were observed by the researchers for more than 12 years and they found out that there is a connection between respiratory problems and heavy incense smoke.

The incense is derived from fragrant plant materials (tree bark, resins, roots, flowers, etc), but if these materials are burnt they could produce severe respiratory problems and could cause cancer by releasing substances such as benzene and polyaromatic hydrocarbons.

The Chinese from Singapore made reports on their use of incense every day, how often they burned it in their homes and for how long. At the beginning of the study, all of them had no respiratory problems and were cancer free. In the next 12 years, nearly 325 men and women developed cancer of the upper respiratory tract and 821 developed lung cancer.

The study and the new findings are now published in the “Cancer” medical journal.