IGF-1 in rBGH Milk Is A Potential Risk Factor For Both Breast and Gastrointestinal Cancers. - GreenMedInfo Summary

Abstract Title:
Unlabeled milk from cows treated with biosynthetic growth hormones: a case of regulatory abdication.

Abstract Source:
Int J Health Serv. 1996;26(1):173-85. PMID: 8932606

Abstract Author(s):
S S Epstein

Article Affiliation:
School of Public Health West, University of Illinois, Chicago 60612, USA.

Abstract:
Levels of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) are substantially elevated and more bioactive in the milk of cows hyperstimulated with the biosynthetic bovine growth hormones rBGH, and are further increased by pasteurization. IGF-1 is absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract, as evidenced by marked growth-promoting effects even in short-term tests in mature rats, and absorption is likely to be still higher in infants. Converging lines of evidence incriminate IGF-1 in rBGH milk as a potential risk factor for both breast and gastrointestinal cancers.

Article Published Date : Jan 01, 1996
Study Type : Commentary
Additional Links
Diseases : Breast Cancer : CK(2372) : AC(660), Gastrointestinal Cancer : CK(43) : AC(11)
Problem Substances : IGF-1 : CK(1) : AC(1), Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) : CK(2) : AC(2)

Monsanto-Funded Science Denies Emerging Roundup-Cancer Link

Monsanto-Funded Science Denies Emerging Roundup-Cancer Link About Information Biography

Source(google.com.pk)

Monsanto-Funded Science Denies Emerging Roundup-Cancer Link

Monsanto-funded research has been proliferating as uncontrollably as their genetically modified (GM) plants, and the bugs increasingly resistant to them.

Two studies have appeared in scientific journals in the past eight months, both funded by Monsanto, and both discrediting a Roundup herbicide-cancer link.[i][ii]
The context within which these new studies are appearing is the growing body of experimental research indicating that the active ingredient in Roundup, glyphosate, along with the surfactants and related "inactive" ingredients found within glyphosate-based formulations, cause genetic damage associated with cancer initiation, and at levels far below those used agricultural applications and associated with real-world exposures.[iii] [iv] [v] [vi] [vii]

This has put manufacturers and proponents of glyphosate, as well as "Roundup Ready" GM plants in a vulnerable position. If, the precautionary principle is employed and a much-needed reclassification of glyphosate as a class III carcinogen to a class II or I occurs, the increasingly global dominance of GM-based food crop systems will come to a screeching, regulation-induced halt.

So, given the threat posed by non-industry funded research on glyphosate’s toxicity,  Monsanto has been putting money into research and development -- but not in the reputable sense of the phrase -- by paying for research to develop the storyline that, despite damning research to contrary, Roundup is still safe.

The newest study, published in the journal Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology titled, "Epidemiologic studies on glyphosate and cancer: A review," declared its glaring conflict of interest in the following manner:

Conflict of Interest Statement
The authors have disclosed the funding source for this research. JSM [study author] has served has a paid consultant to Monsanto Company. Final decisions regarding the content of the manuscript were made solely by the four authors.

Acknowledgment

This research was supported by the Monsanto Company, St. Louis, Missouri

Even if no such conflict was explicitly declared, industry-funded research is almost exclusively positive, minimizing or denying harms to exposed populations associated with the products they are evaluating.

A salient example is the recent summary of 176 studies by Baker[viii] which found that published research looking into the impact of Bisphenol A on human health resulted in exclusively pro-industry findings:

Funding	Harm	No Harm
Industry	0	13 (100%)
Independent (e.g. government)	152 (86%)	11 (14%)

Adding to the problem, the editorial boards of some of the journals within which the questionable science is printed are populated by paid consultants of the very industries they publish ostensibly impartial research on.

For example, the editor of the journal Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology within which latest Monsanto-funded glyphosate-cancer review was published, Gio Batta Gori, is notorious for being a tobacco industry consultant and for publishing junk science in his journal, which has been called: "A Scientific Journal with Industrial Bias as Its Specialty."

His journal published research in 2003, provided by the same company, Exponent, which employs three of the researchers who authored the latest glyphosate-cancer study, as well as one author on the 2011 glyphosate-cancer study, on the purported non-carcinogenicity of dioxin, a highly toxic ingredient in Agent Orange.

Given these obvious conflicts of interest, from the bottom up and the top down, the time has come for people to enact reform with their dollars and their forks, and when worthwhile ballot initiative emerge, their votes.

#1: Stop buying anything not explicitly labeled non-GMO or certified organic, which amounts to the same assurance.

#2: Grow it yourself, or support local organic growers.

#3: Support the California Ballot Initiative to label GMOs.

[i] Developmental and reproductive outcomes in humans and animals after glyphosate exposure: a critical analysis. J Toxicol Environ Health B Crit Rev. 2012 ;15(1):39-96.
[ii] Epidemiologic studies of glyphosate and non-cancer health outcomes: a review. Regul Toxicol Pharmacol. 2011 Nov ;61(2):172-84. Epub 2011 Jul 21.

[iii] Marc, J., Mulner-Lorillon, O., Boulben, S., Hureau, D., Durand, G., and Belle, R. 2002. Pesticide Roundup provokes cell division dysfunction at the level of CDK1/cyclin
B activation. Chem. Res. Toxicol. 15: 326–31.

[iv] Marc, J., Mulner-Lorillon, O., Durand, G., and Belle, R. 2003. Embryonic cell cycle for risk
assessment of pesticides at the molecular level. Environnemental. Chemistry. letters. 1: 8–12.

[v] Marc, J., Belle, R., Morales, J., Cormier, P., and Mulner-Lorillon, O. 2004a. Formulated
glyphosate activates the DNA-response checkpoint of the cell cycle leading to the
prevention of G2/M transition. Toxicol. Sci. 82: 436–42

[vi] Marc, J., Mulner-Lorillon, O., and Belle, R. 2004b. Glyphosate-based pesticides affect
cell cycle regulation. Biol. Cell. 96: 245–49.

[vii] Marc, J., Le Breton, M., Cormier, P., Morales, J., Belle, R., and Mulner-Lorillon, O. 2005.
A glyphosate-based pesticide impinges on transcription. Toxicol. Appl. Pharmacol.
203:1–8.

[viii] Baker, Nena (2008). The Body Toxic. North Point Press. p. 142. [cited from Lessig 2011, p. 25 Lay summary].

Will The GMO-Breast Cancer Link Be Pink-Washed Away?

GMO-Breast Cancer About Information Biography 

Source(google.com.pk)

GMO-Breast Cancer 

With Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM) less than two weeks away, the latest bombshell GMO/Roundup study produced by a French research team, and presently making international headlines, is well-timed. The researchers found, in the first long-term GM corn and Roundup feeding study of its kind, that female rats, exposed to concentrations well below official safety limits, developed massive, progressive mammary tumors which either lead to premature death, or required euthanasia due to their great suffering.

Why would this be of concern to BCAM? After all, BCAM is the annual pinkwashing celebration, where people collectively and forcibly remove the thought of there being preventable and treatable causes of breast cancer from their minds, hurl themselves over the lemming-like cliff of cause-marketing, e.g. Buckets for a Cure, sacrificing their time, energy and money raising billions more for a pharmaceutical cure for a pharmaceutically incurable condition.  This annual ritual celebrates ribbon-wearing vacuity, pretending like "carcinogens" don't exist, or that it doesn't matter that a carcinogen-producing chemical company, now defunct Imperial Chemical Industries, and its  pharmaceutical subsidiary, Zeneca, co-founded Breast Cancer Awareness Month in 1985.  

Zeneca, of course, merged with Astra AB in 1999, becoming AstraZeneca, manufacturer of the breast cancer blockbuster drugs Arimidex and Tamoxifen. By pushing for widespread adoption of breast screenings they generated millions of new and future customers (mammography-induced breast cancer), even while one of the main forms of mammography-detected cancer, Ductal Carcinoma In Situ (DCIS), is often intrinisically benign, better left untreated with conventional, highly toxic "therapies" like radiation and chemotherapy.

The conflict of interest here is as devastating as it is obvious, which is why we hope the new finding linking GM corn and Roundup herbicide to breast cancer will compel BCAM to respond, and change their awareness strategy to become more patient- versus industry-friendly. One thing is for sure. The study's findings were not vague or equivocal, but disturbingly clear...

In an interview, Dr. Michael Antoniou, molecular biologist at Kings College, London, and a member of the CRIIGEN scientific council who funded the study, said

This is the most thorough research ever published into the health effects of GM food crops and the herbicide Roundup on rats. It shows an extraordinary number of tumors developing earlier and more aggressively - particularly in female animals.  I am shocked by the extreme negative health impacts.

The rat has long been used as a surrogate for human toxicity. All new pharmaceutical, agricultural and household substances are, prior to their approval, tested on rats. This is as good an indicator as we can expect that the consumption of GM maize and the herbicide Roundup, impacts seriously on human health.

Here are some passages excerpted directly from the study

Suffering inducing euthanasia and deaths corresponded mostly in females to the development of large mammary tumors. These appeared to be clearly related to the various treatments when compared to the control groups. These tumors are generally known to be mostly estrogen-dependent (Harvell et al., 2000). We observed a strikingly marked induction of mammary tumors by R[roundup] alone, a major formulated pesticide, even at the very lowest dose administered. R[oundup] has been shown to disrupt aromatase which synthesizes estrogens (Richard et al., 2005)...  [pg. 9]

In conclusion, it was previously known that glyphosate consumption in water above authorized limits may provoke hepatic and kidney failures (EPA). The results of the study presented here clearly demonstrate that lower levels of complete agricultural glyphosate herbicide formulations, at concentrations well below officially set safety limits, induce severe hormone-dependent mammary, hepatic and kidney disturbances. [pg. 10]

Breast cancer, by the way, is the #1 form of cancer which afflicts women today, and cancer the #2 cause of mortality in women. What if women were being advised to equate "prevention," not with exposing their breasts to highly carcinogenic x-ray wavelengths, i.e. "early detection via mammography" but with removing all non-organic, pesticide-laden and GMO food in their diet, immediately?  Would this not be an excellent precautionary step to take, given the latest findings on their carcinogenicity?

GMO-Breast Cancer

No, BCAM won't advocate this point. Nor will Susan G. Komen, one of BCAM's partners. How do we know this? It is easy to confirm. Simply go to their respective websites (note: BCAM decommissioned their website last year and created a one page landing page) and type in the word "carcinogen," and you will find the word has been virtually pinkwashed out of the conversation, and where it does occur on the Susan G. Komen website search results page in 3 places, you will find information minimizing the link between smoking and breast cancer: "Because there is no established link between smoking and breast cancer risk, it is unlikely secondhand smoke exposure is related to an increase in risk." Common sense, of course is not applicable, since the church of scientism and their priest-like "experts" have not proven, unequivocally in clinical studies that smoking can harm your breast health.  Outrageous!

Or, according to Susan G. Komen, "The scientific evidence to date shows no link...between organocholorine [pesticides] and breast cancer risk."[i]

Get the drift? This is not an organization that is advocating for the identification and removal of the preventable causes of breast cancer, rather, is doing the exact opposite, either by pretending there are no environmental causes (must be in the genes somewhere folks), or minimizing or denying that exposure to carcinogens actually cause cancer.

If pink doesn't make you see red, you may not be understanding what is going on here. Perhaps a few more outrageous examples will suffice .... Acrylamide, found in fried foods, is a carcinogen, and has been recently linked to breast cancer, but you can find a bucket of KFC emblazoned with the pink ribboned theme.  Eli Lilly now manufactures and owns one of Monsanto's notorious inventions: recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH), used to increase mammary gland size and productive capacity in cows, and linked to breast cancer, and also produces cancer drugs like Gemzar, profiting on both ends. [ii]  Or just look at the thousands of products now being pimped in the name of BCAM and pinkwashing campaigns manufactured either with, or including known human carcinogens.

We all need to wake up. Breast Cancer Awareness Month needs to be renamed Pinkwashing Awareness Month, and the true causes and cures for cancer disseminated to those folks whose very lives depends on the availability of such information.  The carcinogenicity of Roundup herbicide and GMO food will continued to be denied by self-appointed authoritative organizations, non-governmental and governmental alike, but we can make a difference today by exercising our right not to purchase or consume products that contain these ingredients. California's Proposition 37 is a great place to start. Please support the Just Label It initiative today.

Olive Constituent Blocks Alzheimer's and Breast Cancer

Olive Constituent Blocks Alzheimer's and Breast About Information Biography

Source(google.com.pk)

Olive Constituent Blocks Alzheimer's and Breast

Two recent studies have found that a constituent of olives and olive oil inhibits the growth of breast cancer and the development of Alzheimer's disease.

The breast cancer research comes from scientists at the King Saud University. The researchers treated human breast cancer cells with a constituent of olives known as Oleuropein. The testing found that Oleuropein produced genetic changes among breast cancer cells that serve to inhibit their ability to metastasize and grow throughout the body.

One of the two key genetic changes influenced by the Oleuropein was the inhibition of the matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) enzymes. These MMPs – specifically MMP2 and MMP9 - usher the process of metastasizing. The MMP enzymes were blocked, effectively inhibiting the spread of the cancer.

The Oleuropein extract also stimulated a genetic expression of the TIMP gene. When these genes are expressed, through a polymerase chain reaction, tumor growth is halted.

The researchers concluded that: "Treatment of breast cancer cells with oleuropein could help in prevention of cancer metastasis by increasing the TIMPs and suppressing the MMPs gene expressions."

In a separate study – this from researchers from Greece's National Center for Scientific Research – Oleuropein was found to inhibit the development of brain cell amyloid-beta protein precursor along with β-amyloid (Aβ) metabolism. Aβ metabolism has been linked to causing long-term memory loss among elderly persons.

The researchers treated human cells that had become subjected to the growth of β-amyloid protein complex – duplicating what occurs within the brain of someone developing Alzheimer's. They treated the cells with Oleuropein and found that the olive extract interacted with the amyloid proteins in such a way that halted the Aβ metabolism process. In this case, Oleuropein stimulated MMP-9 activity amongst these amyloid-beta complexed cells. Increasing MMP-9 activity helps reduce the amyloid-beta oligomers amongst these cells.

The researchers concluded that: "The experimental data reveal an anti-amyloidogenic effect of Oleuropein and suggest a possible protective role for Oleuropein against Alzheimer's disease, extending the spectrum of beneficial properties of this naturally occurring polyphenol."

While olives contain a number of polyphenols, Oleuropein is one of the best known. Other polyphenols within olives and olive oil can include hydroxytyrosol, tyrosol and verbascoside.

Along with these benefits, Oleuropein has been found to dilate the blood vessels, reducing blood pressure and increasing bloodflow. Olive's high level of antioxidants also gives it a tremendous anti-inflammatory capacity, especially among the cardiovascular system. Olive leaf has been found to be antiviral. It appears to inhibit virus' ability to replicate, preventing viral shedding and budding within the cells and cell membrane.

Olives are also rich in a host of other beneficial nutrients, including copper, vitamin E and iron. The olive also contains a unique monounsaturated fatty acid called oleic acid. Olive oil also contains linoleic, palmitic, stearic and linolenic fatty acids. The combination of fats in olive helps balance pro-inflammatory fats such as saturated fats and arachidonic acids in other foods.

This blend of fatty acids, along with its antioxidants, gives olives and olive oil its proven ability to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and help prevent inflammatory diseases such as arthritis.

Olive oil comes with a variety of labels, including virgin or extra virgin. Virgin oil must maintain a standard of less than 1.5-2% acidity (depending upon the country or origin), while extra virgin must maintain less than 0.8% acidity. A misnomer is that extra virgin is supposed to be from the first pressing. Rather, oil manufacturers find that certain seasonal pressings of certain olive varietals will produce the desired lower acid levels.

Many also assume that extra virgin oil utilizes only a mechanical press, but virgin olive oil also must be mechanically pressed. This contrasts to using chemical solvents to extract the oil. Most conventional vegetable oils are chemically extracted, while most olive oils are mechanically pressed. It should be noted that some mechanically pressed olive oils are blended with others to achieve the lower acidity - which is regulated by the Italian, Greece and government agencies.

In addition, high quality extra virgin olive oil is typically cold pressed, because it is mechanically pressed and utilizes less heat in the process. Most of the high quality extra virgin olive oils are cold pressed. Mechanical cold pressing helps preserve some of the heat-sensitive polyphenols and other nutrients contained within a fresh olive.

Pickling olives in a vinegar solution is one of the easiest and more delicious ways to preserve the polyphenol content of fresh olives.

Acrylamide Increases Women's Breast Cancer Risk

Acrylamide Increases Women's Breast Cancer Risk About Information Biography

Source(google.com.pk)

Acrylamide Increases Women's Breast Cancer Risk

Researchers from the Danish Cancer Society Research Center in Copenhagen have determined that acrylamide consumption – found with higher amounts in fried and grilled foods - significantly increases the risk of breast cancer among women.

The researchers followed 24,697 postmenopausal women as part of a Danish study between 1993 and 1997. Out of the population, 420 of the women developed breast cancer prior to 2001. Of these, 110 of the women died of breast cancer prior to 2009.

The study gauged the women's consumption of acrylamide by measuring their acrylamide hemoglobin and glycidamide hemoglobin levels in the bloodstream. The study found that higher levels of acrylamide and glycidamide hemoglobin in the women's bloodstream was associated with a higher risk of breast cancer.

Acrylamide Metabolites

Upon consumption of acrylamide, some of it forms glycidamide hemoglobin and some combines with hemoglobin to form acrylamide hemoglobin.

On average, the researchers found that higher levels of glycidamide hemoglobin in the blood was associated with a 63% higher risk of dying from all breast cancers, and more than double the risk of developing an estrogen receptor-positive tumor.

Acrylamide hemoglobin levels also increased the risk of death the risk of estrogen receptor-positive tumors.

The researchers concluded that "the present study indicates that pre-diagnostic exposure to acrylamide may be related to mortality among breast cancer patients and that this may especially concern the most endocrine related type of breast cancer."

Acrylamide linked to other cancers

Research over the past two decades has linked increased acrylamide consumption to a number of cancer types, including colorectal and endometrial cancers.

Acrylamide content in foods reported by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has found that many fried and baked foods contain several hundred micrograms up to 2,500 micrograms per serving. Early research suggested that consumption of less than 0.2 micrograms per day was safe.

Acrylamide Sources

Acrylamides are produced when starches or sugars are cooked at high temperatures for an extended period. Potato chips, French fries, charred and grilled foods, and some caramelized high-heat baked goods have high levels. Cigarette smoke and roasted coffee also contains significant levels of acrylamides. Other data has found that smokers will have almost twice the levels of circulating acrylamide and glycidamide hemoglobin.

The prevalent issues that relate to increased risk of acrylamide intake stem from the foods we choose to eat, and how we cook them. A diet heavy in processed foods - including baked goods and processed meats - increases our intake of acrylamides. Foods that are pre-cooked, such as chips, cookies and any other fried or baked good will have higher acrylamide levels because the food manufacturers must either overcook or cook both the ingredients and the final goods before being packaged to prevent contamination. This double-cooking and over-cooking process produces more acrylamide content in the end product.

Many foods, such as nuts and seeds, are typically available in both their raw form or roasted forms. Roasted forms often taste better, but they also yield higher acrylamide content.

How we cook our food at home significantly relates to the amount of acrylamide in our diets. Foods cooked on grills or open flames will have more acrylamide content because the food is in contact with more heat. Foods that are fried will also have a higher content, because we typically fry our foods at high temperatures. Grilling or toasting our foods until they are blackened also produces higher acrylamide content in the food. This goes for toast as well as grilled cheese sandwiches, which can both be toasted lightly and still taste great.

Lowering acrylamide content in our diets means eating more fresh and raw foods, and cooking as minimally as possible. When we do cook, using the lowest temperatures possible, and being careful not to overcook the food will result in less acrylamide consumption. Lightly toasting or lightly grilling our foods will often render better tasting food as well as lower acrylamide levels.

Sodas, Fries, Snacks and Inactivity Raise Diabetes Risk

Sodas, Fries, Snacks and Inactivity Raise Diabetes Risk About Information Biography

Source(google.com.pk)

Sodas, Fries, Snacks and Inactivity Raise Diabetes Risk

Researchers from the The Netherlands' Utrecht University Medical Center have determined in a large study that a diet rich in soft drinks, fries and snacks substantially increases the risk of type 2 diabetes.

The research followed 20,835 Dutch people. The researchers monitored the diets and diet patterns of the patients through questionnaires and cross-referenced these with the incidence of type 2 diabetes among the subjects.

The analysis allowed the researchers to separate the subjects' diets into two general patterns. The first pattern found a variety of foods, which included diets rich in fruits, vegetables and lean protein foods were accompanied by a lower risk of diabetes. Those subjects with a dietary pattern with increased intake of soft drinks, fries and snacks, however, had an increased incidence of type 2 diabetes.

The dietary analysis found that those in the highest quarter percentile of this dietary pattern (increased intake of soft drinks, fries and snacks) had a 70% higher incidence of type 2 diabetes than those in the lowest quarter percentile of this dietary pattern.

Additionally, type 2 diabetes increased to more than twice the incidence among subjects who were in the highest quarter percentile together with less physical activity.

Increased physical activity also decreased the incidence of type 2 diabetes among those who were in the highest quarter percentile of eating more soft drinks, fries and snacks. The risk of type 2 diabetes decreased from 70% more incidence to 35% more incidence in those who got more exercise.

The researchers concluded

A high score on a pattern high in soft drinks, fries and snacks and low in fruit and vegetables was associated with higher risk of type 2 diabetes in overweight and obese subjects especially among physically less active individuals.

The hard news on soft drinks

As we break down the increased risk to the type of consumption, we find that soft drinks have been linked with not just diabetes, but also cardiovascular diseases, metabolic syndrome (which includes diabetes and cardiovascular disease), non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, gout in men, obesity, increased dental caries and gum disease. Many have connected this to the increased level of sugar in the diet, and newer research has linked this to increased consumption of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).

For example, in a recent study of over 2,700 Taiwanese teenagers, researchers from Taiwan's National Yang Ming University found that those who drank more beverages sweetened with sugar and HFCS had three to five times the risk of being obese, and double the risk of having gout when compared to those who did not drink sodas.

Fried risk

As for fries, research has also connected the eating of fried foods with increased cardiovascular disease, obesity and diabetes. Other risks include breast cancer, as we reported on a recent study showing the increased consumption of acrylamide is linked to greater levels of breast cancer.

Whether the acrylamide content is the only precipitating factor with fried foods has yet to be determined, but there is strong evidence pointing to overcooked oils becoming toxic in themselves. When many oils are heated beyond their smoke point, the fatty acids can convert to trans fats or other types of damaged fats. These can become peroxidized and form lipoperoxides within the body. These lipoperoxides will form greater levels of LDL and VLDL, and will damage the liver and blood vessels, forming atherosclerosis.

Illustrating this effect, in a recent study from the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia, researchers found a link between type 2 diabetes and stroke in those with higher levels of lipid peroxidation.

A lethal combo

These two diet issues – increased consumption of refined sweeteners such as HFCS and eating fried foods – come together in the form of many of our snack foods. Many snacks are both sweetened with these refined sugars and deep-fried. These include many of our potato chips, crackers and others.

Baked snacks with little or no sugar should thus be considered healthier, but a survey of snacks in practically any store will reveal that healthier snacks - outside of fruits and vegetables - often require a bit more diligence to find.

30 Years of Breast Screening: 1.3 Million Wrongly Treated

30 Years of Breast Screening: 1.3 Million Wrongly Treated About Biography Information 

Source(google.com.pk)

30 Years of Breast Screening: 1.3 Million Wrongly Treated

The breast cancer industry's holy grail (that mammography is the primary weapon in the war against breast cancer) has been disproved. In fact, mammography appears to have CREATED 1.3 million cases of breast cancer in the U.S. population that were not there.

A disturbing new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine is bringing mainstream attention to the possibility that mammography has caused far more harm than good in the millions of women who have employed it over the past 30 years as their primary strategy in the fight against breast cancer.[i]

Titled "Effect of Three Decades of Screening Mammography on Breast-Cancer Incidence," researchers estimated that among women younger than 40 years of age, breast cancer was overdiagnosed, i.e. "tumors were detected on screening that would never have led to clinical symptoms," in 1.3 million U.S. women over the past 30 years. In 2008, alone, "breast cancer was overdiagnosed in more than 70,000 women; this accounted for 31% of all breast cancers diagnosed."

As we revealed in a previous article,[ii] the primary form of mammography-detected breast cancer is ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), also known as 'stage zero' or 'non-invasive breast cancer.' Unlike truly invasive cancer, which expands outward like the crab after which it was named (Greek:  Cancer = Crab), ductal carcinoma is in situ, i.e. situated, non-moving – an obvious contradiction in terms.

Also, DCIS presents without symptoms in the majority of women within which it is detected, and if left untreated will (usually) not progress to cause harm to women. Indeed, without x-ray diagnostic technologies, many if not most of the women diagnosed with it would never have known they had it in the first place. The journal Lancet Oncology, in fact, published a cohort study last year finding that even clinically verified "invasive" cancers appear to regress with time if left untreated:

[We] believe many invasive breast cancers detected by repeated mammography screening do not persist to be detected by screening at the end of 6 years, suggesting that the natural course of many of the screen-detected invasive breast cancers is to spontaneously regress.[iii]

The new study authors point out "The introduction of screening mammography in the United States has been associated with a doubling in the number of cases of early-stage breast cancer that are detected each year." And yet, they noted, only 6.5% of these early-stage breast cancer cases were expected to progress to advanced disease. DCIS and related 'abnormal breast findings,' in other words, may represent natural, benign variations in breast morphology. Preemptive treatment strategies, however, are still employed today as the standard of care, with mastectomy rates actually increasing since 2004.[iv]

The adverse health effects associated with overdiagnosis and overtreatment with lumpectomy, radiation, chemotherapy and hormone-suppressive treatments cannot be underestimated, especially when one considers the profound psychological trauma that follows each stage of diagnosis and treatment, and the additional physiological burdens such psychic injuries lead to, including up-regulation of multidrug resistance genes within cancer as a result of the increased adrenaline associated with the 'flight-or-fight' stress response.[v]

Also, it is now coming to light that chemotherapy and radiation actually increase the proportion of the highly malignant cancer stem cells to the relatively non-malignant daughter cells within the tumor colony. Much in the same way that conventional antibiotic agents will drive multidrug resistance within the subpopulation of surviving post-antibiotic bacteria, ensuring recurrence, conventional treatments also drive the surviving stem-cell enriched tumor populations into greater resistance and metastatic potential when it does inevitably recur. Or worse, radiation therapy may actually increase the 'stemness' of breast cancer cells making them 30 times more malignant (capable of forming new tumors).

If it is indeed true that DCIS, other abnormal breast findings, as well as clinically confirmed invasive breast cancer, either remain benign or regress when left untreated, the entire breast cancer industry, which is already deeply mired in cause-marketing conflicts of interest, must radically reform itself, or face massive financial and ethical liabilities vis-à-vis outdated and no longer "evidence-based" practices.

Another serious problem with mammography (and there are dozens of them) not addressed in this latest research finding concerns the unique carcinogenicity of the x-rays the technology employs. We now know that the 30 kVp radiation, colloquially known as "low energy" x-rays, are between 300-400% more carcinogenic than the "higher energy" radiation given off by atomic bomb blasts (200 kVp or higher).[vi]  Present day radiation risk models used to assess the known breast cancer risk associated with mammography against the purported benefits do not take into this profound discrepancy. In fact, these models were developed before DNA was even discovered.

Also, considering that breast cancer susceptibility genes, BRCA1/BRCA2, interfere with the DNA self-repair mechanisms needed to reduce the carcinogenicity associated with radiation exposure within those who carry these genetic variations, the harms associated with mammography may be exponentially higher than the conventional medical community presently understands and communicates to their patients.  Indeed, it is likely that x-ray based mammography screenings have been planting the seeds of future radiation-induced breast cancer within exposed populations.

With top-tier biomedical journals now publishing research diametrically opposed to the policies and recommendations of both governmental, non-governmental and industry-sponsored health organizations, the time is ripe for us to critically evaluate conventional medicine's conventional standard of care and to educate ourselves further to the true causes of cancer, and how to go about preventing and/or removing them.