It has been demonstrated that polymorphisms within
inflammation-related genes are associated with risk of gastric
carcinoma in Helicobacter pylori-infected individuals. Recently, several studies have reported conflicting results regarding the association between the
interleukin (IL)8-251*T/*A polymorphism and risk of gastric
carcinoma. In this study, we performed a case-control analysis, including 693 controls, 187 chronic
gastritis cases and 333 gastric
carcinoma cases, to determine the association between the IL8-251 polymorphism and risk of chronic
gastritis and gastric
carcinoma in the northern Portugal population. We found no significant association between the IL8-251 polymorphism and increased risk of chronic
gastritis or gastric
carcinoma, in agreement with that reported in other populations of white origin. The retrospective analysis of published data shows that the association between the IL8-251 polymorphism and risk of gastric
carcinoma tends to be reproducible in populations of Asian origin. The estimated effect of the polymorphism under analysis was not significantly different in subgroups of gastric
carcinoma cases defined by histologic type and anatomic site of the tumours, and by sex and age of the participants. In conclusion our results indicate that although the IL8-251 polymorphism might be a relevant host susceptibility factor for gastric
carcinoma development, this association is likely to be ethnic-specific.