Hormonal Factors Likely Cause of Increased Breast Cancer in Young Women, Doctors Suggest

TUCSON, Ariz., Feb. 28, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The increase in invasive breast cancer in young women over the past 3 decades, reported in the Feb. 27 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), is not a new finding, states the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS).

For years, breast surgeons have been seeing widely metastatic breast cancer—formerly a disease of older women—in young mothers of the Roe v Wade generation. Angela Lanfranchi, M.D., explained the role of hormones of pregnancy in a 2008 issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.

The 2,000 percent increase in estrogen early in pregnancy causes proliferation of cancer-vulnerable Type 1 and Type 2 lobules. Induced abortion prevents the transformation of this tissue into cancer-resistant Type 4 lobules that occurs late in pregnancy due to hormones produced by the maturing fetal-placental unit.

The incidence of breast cancer increased 40 percent between 1973 and 1998, and breast cancer became a young woman's disease, wrote Karen Malec of the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer in a 2003 article. While at least 29 published studies have shown a significant association between induced abortion and breast cancer, the link is denied by the National Cancer Institute.

In a 2005 article, Joel Brind, Ph.D., of Baruch College discussed methodologic flaws in the prospective studies used by NCI in its denial. The flaws are serious enough to invalidate the negative findings.

An additional risk is the widespread use of hormonal contraceptives (birth control pills), which the World Health Organization determined to be a human carcinogen in 2005. Women are quite likely to be given the Pill right after an abortion has left their breasts in a more vulnerable state.

"Patients have the right to know about potential side effects of medical treatments," stated AAPS executive director Jane M. Orient, M.D. "Yet the abortion industry and abortion-rights advocates in government and academia are failing to disclose the evidence and rationale for an abortion/breast cancer link."

In an amicus brief filed in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood, concerning parental notification for abortion in minors, AAPS cited a review article concluding that "clinicians are obliged to inform pregnant women that a decision to abort her first pregnancy may almost double her lifetime risk of breast cancer through loss of the protective effect of a completed first full-term pregnancy earlier in life." This effect is most pronounced in women under age 20.

The heartbreak of deadly breast cancer in mothers with young children may draw much needed attention to the hormonal factor.

The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) is a national organization representing physicians in all specialties, founded in 1943.

SOURCE Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS)