The chances of a woman getting cancer are 26 percent higher among women who work in labs, according to a study carried out by the Health Ministry recently.

The study did not determine whether there is a direct link between working in labs and getting cancer, and does not state that the high percentage is due to their exposure to materials that cause cancer.

Professor Gad Rennert, who headed the study, said that, "at first, we did not find anything unusual. However, when we checked the percentage of women working over 20 years in labs, we found a cancer rate that is 26 percent higher than average."

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The most popular forms of cancer discovered were breast and skin cancer, as well as lymphoma.

Prof. Rennert could not point to a direct link between the high cancer rate and the fact that these women work in labs and said that the cause could be the socio-economic characteristics of these women.

"The chances of getting breast cancer rises when women give birth to a small number of children, do not breast feed and give birth to their first child at a late age. These characteristics are most common among educated and working women - the kind of women who work in labs."

Despite this, since the study could not rule out a direct connection, it recommended that all women working in labs for an extended period of time should be examined for cancer and that the proper safety precautions be made.

The Health Ministry is mulling over these recommendations. Even before these recommendations were made, the ministry began having safety courses recently for all lab-workers.