Sunday, December 14, 2008

Abortion and Breast cancer

"Abortion does not cause breast cancer" states several news media articles and now, a new health site.

There is one problem with this - it's unproven. In the article I read on the health site, they did not specifically name their cites upon which they are wanting to risk YOUR life but they talked of an (unnamed) 2004 study which is likely the "Melbye study". In this study, Dr Melbye admitted that any woman who had had an abortion before computer records was likely listed as "not having abortion" since ONLY computer recorded abortions were noted in the study AS aborted women. One estimate puts the number of aborted women "overlooked" as 60,000! And these were, of course, the older women who were more likely to have breast cancer. If these 60,000 women were (correctly) recorded as HAVING HAD abortions, the Melbye Study would suggest a STRONGER link between breast cancer than some of the other 38 world wide studies which suggest a link.

Another study they may have used to "prove" that abortion does not cause breast cancer was the Beral study. This study not only used an inappropriate group for comparison (women who had never been pregnant who were known to have a higher risk for breast cancer) but omitted several studies which suggested a link including three of the study author's OWN studies! About this type of study, Angela Lanfranchi, M.D., F.A.C.S. wrote:

>>>>Studies that take data from many previous studies and reanalyze” them (or put them into a meta-analysis) need to have sound scientific reasons for excluding some published studies. Without valid exclusion and inclusion criteria, the results can be skewed and inaccurate because they may allow an author’s personal bias to consciously or subconsciously enter the selection process, thus corrupting the conclusion. Undoubtedly, this sort of bias is what has led some observers to call epidemiology a pseudoscience.<<<< (Ethics and Medicine, Vol 29, 11 November 2004)


Just another example of the media perpetuating bad science to the American people to support a billion dollar industry which does NOT care about your body.

More information:
Breast Cancer Faq

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