Post Punk Kitchen Forum

Maybe it's because I'm a guy and grew up in an overtly religious community that was pretty widely pro-life but abortion just wasn't a regular topic of discussion (then again maybe I just grew up with a bunch of prudes since my mom tried to have "the talk" with me in my senior year of highschool a few months before I left for the army). It was only recently (I'm 29 now) that I first heard the claim of abortion linked to breast cancer from a family member that works at a crisis pregnancy center (I have plenty of opinons about that, but it's not the point of this post). I ran across this article today and passed it onto the person so I'm interested in seeing what they have to say if they take the time to read it but also wanted to share it with you all.

It's a long read, but I thought it was a pretty well written and well cited history of the claim.

Breast Cancer and the Politics of Abortion in the United States

Interesting, but I wasn't able to glean much information because they didn't give many details from the cited studies. The author mentioned " when controlling for other factors" when discussing the studies, but I'm curious as to what factors they controlled. Especially since there are so many chemicals in our world today that we don't know the effect of, BPA, growth hormones in meat/dairy, aluminum in deodorant, etc. etc. I would think the link of abortion to breast cancer would be difficult to research since it is compounded by hormone changes in bodies due to hormonal birth control, miscarriages, breast feeding (I assume that changes hormone levels somehow, although I don't really know) etc, and all the environmental factors as well. Also this would be extremely low on my priority list of what should be researched in terms of cancer prevention, but that is just me.

I definitely agree and that was part of the reason why I was curious how it came about to be claimed as such a definitive link by the pro-life movement. My takeaway from the article is summarized pretty well by prochoice.org's explanation of breast cancer (to paraphrase): the studies being cited were simplistic, flawed, outdated, and have been refuted but continue to be used for political, not medical purposes.

http://www.prochoice.org/about_abortion/facts/abortion_breast_cancer.html

I'm not really sure what the point is except to give the anti-choice moment a "medical reason" to make abortion illegal or more difficult to get. Considering how much (yet how little) we know about how people get cancer in the first place, and how scary the word "cancer" is to most people, it appears to be a way to fear women into not getting abortions. Especially since it appears the research has been shown to be quite flawed.

Aren't these the same kind of people against hpv/cervical cancer vaccines coz it makes the ladies lose their moral bearing?

Anti-choice advocates want science to back them up. Unfortunately, that means they do really faulty studies and then try to get them published in the scientific literature. I'm thinking of post-abortion trauma, for example. There was a study a little while back saying that women developed mental health issues post-abortion in astronomically high numbers (something like 81%), except that the researchers looked at if the woman developed a mental health issue at any point in her life, including before she had an abortion. The study was debunked, but not until after it made the news and was quoted all over the place. The head researcher had made anti-choice statements in the past.

I think it was the AMA that did a big review of studies on the subject, and after demonstrating the high number of methodological issues with the studies (i.e., things like comparing women who had abortions due to unplanned pregnancy to women who had planned pregnancies, instead of women who gave children up for adoption) concluded that women who had one abortion were no more likely to be traumatized than women who had one unplanned pregnancy and didn't abort (there haven't been enough studies on multiple abortions/pregnancies to determine anything). But that isn't scary enough to deter women from having abortions. "Breast cancer" and "PTSD" might be.

that's because breasts aren't intimidating and women who get cooch cancer deserve it for using the dark power of the snatch to con unwitting men into a life of sin. or something.

I have heard that the chances of breast cancer increase if a woman does not have children (so unfair). Perhaps anti-choice advocates are twisting those studies to say not having children = having abortions so that is what causes it?

Randi, I think that's exactly it, as well as women who have children later have increased risk of breast cancer.

Randi and Ariann, I believe you're correct. I remember this being discussed in a college class I took on the biology of human reproduction. However, I'm not sure if it's correct to say that nulliparity (or delayed parity) increases the risk of breast cancer, rather than bearing children past 20 weeks decreases the risk of breast cancer.

Either way, I think it's some awfully twisted anti-abortion reasoning. After all, pregnancy has its own set of risks that seem to go ignored. And as abortion restrictions have been passed based on other nonscientific claims (like when a fetus can feel pain), this kind of claim always concerns me.

(Full disclosure, I didn't read the article.)

What's the difference between one increasing the risk and the other decreasing the risk? What's the baseline?

No idea, I was just speculating that semantics might make a difference on the perception of the data, really. I pretty much suck at science.

someone i know wrote this blog in response to this: "Last week, the NH House passed a bill requiring physicians to counsel women that abortions can cause breast cancer. Yes, that's right. They passed a bill requiring that physicians tell their patient what amounts to a LIE."

http://patientspatienceandpaces.blogspo ... of-my.html

Oh that's an awesome post!