PARIS (AFP) -- Airline cabin crew face an enhanced risk of developing skin and breast cancer, a specialist journal on health in the workplace, Occupational and Environmental Medicine, reported on Wednesday.

An Icelandic study of 1,532 current and former female flight attendants found that 35 of them had developed breast cancer, especially among older personnel.

Swedish research, meanwhile, found malignant skin cancer among male and women cabin crew was up to three times the expected rate.

Previous research has drawn a strong but statistical link between cancer and airline pilots, stirring speculation that flying at high altitude for long flights might expose air industry professionals to dangerous levels of ionizing radiation from the sun.

An Icelandic study published in 2000 found that incidence of skin cancer among pilots flying for the national carrier Icelandic on international routes, which are long and at high altitude, was between 13 and 15 times higher than on domestic routes.

An unresolved question, though, is whether "lifestyle factors" are to blame.

For instance, airline crew might be keener on sun-tanning than others, and this could explain higher cancer rates, at least in part.

Occupational and Environmental Medicine is published by the British Medical Association (BMA).