US News

Douglas’ camp backpedaling on cancer cause – rep says actor didn’t specifically blame oral sex for his tumor

Michael Douglas sped into full backpedal today, in hopes of un-ringing the bell from admissions that his cancer was caused by oral sex.

The actor’s rep Allen Burry said Douglas was taken out of context in a British newspaper story, where he appeared to blame oral sex for his 2010 bout with throat cancer.

The Guardian newspaper, in an interview published yesterday, asked if Douglas regretted years of boozing and smoking — the assumed causes of his throat cancer.

“Without wanting to get too specific, this particular cancer is caused by HPV (human papillomavirus), which actually comes about from cunnilingus,” Douglas said.

Listen to the audio of the Douglas interview here.

The actor went on to say that stress from son Cameron Douglas’ legal woes didn’t help. But in his Guardian interview, Douglas brought the conversation back to oral sex.

“I did worry if the stress caused by my son’s incarceration didn’t help trigger it,” the “Wall Street” actor said of Cameron Douglas, who is serving 10 years in a federal prison for heroin possession and distribution.

“But, yeah, it’s a sexually transmitted disease that causes [the] cancer.”

Now Burry is trying to claim that Douglas, 68, was only speaking in generalities — about various causes of throat cancer, not the actor’s exact ailment.

Smoking and drinking are still the most common links to throat cancer.

And before Douglas’ comments were published yesterday, the “Streets of San Francisco” actor seemed to go along with that line.

He told the “Late Show with David Letterman” on Aug. 31, 2010: “I smoke cigarettes and I drank. This particular type of cancer is caused by alcohol, drinking.”

The Guardian story did not mention if the oral sex in question was with Douglas’ younger, beautiful wife Catherine Zeta-Jones, 43.

With Post Wire Services