ENDEAVOUR FORUM NEWSLETTER No. 110, APRIL 2003

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The lecture tour  of Australia and  New Zealand by breast surgeon,  Dr. Angela Lanfranchi, MD, FACS, certainly created  quite a firestorm. The Age criticized  Endeavour Forum  on the front page  on 10th February (just below  George Bush/Saddam Hussein) implying that the Breast Cancer Prevention  Institute  booklet "Breast Cancer Risks and  Prevention"  was a pro-life booklet  and that Stonnington Council should not have given us a photocopying grant.  There  was further criticism and an editorial on llth February.   Age reporter, Tom  Noble, also quoted Dr. John Collins of the breast unit,  Royal Melbourne Hospital, saying it  was not his experience that women with a family history of breast cancer who had  an abortion under age 18, developed breast cancer. 

In a letter to the editor of  The Age, I  pointed out that  "Breast Cancer Risks and  Prevention"   was not a pro-life booklet as it did not even mention the unborn  child.  There is  very  little  about abortion, which is only referred to in the  context of being a risk factor for  breast cancer.  A "pro-life" booklet would have  had pictures of fetal development, aborted babies, and would have mentioned all  the other hazards of abortion  - which occur with  much greater frequency than  breast cancer,  e.g. psychological trauma.   I also queried the basis of Dr. Collins'  assertion:     how did  he know that Australian teens who were aborted and had a family history of breast cancer didn't develop breast cancer by age 45?.  Did  Collins  ask these teens their family history prior to abortion?  Why would he ask anyway if he doesn't see any connection between induced abortion and breast cancer?  And which abortion clinic follows up aborted teenagers till age 45?  Where is Dr. Collins’ published research?  Our booklet  is fully referenced with articles in peer-reviewed  medical journals. 

My letter was not published by The Age, nor did Dr. Collins answer a personal  email I sent him  asking him the basis for his  assertions. Letters to The Age  by Endeavour Forum secretary, Lucy De Summa, and  Professor Joel Brind  (11/2) were  also not published.  Greg Byrne's letter  was published, but it was heavily edited. Lucy’s letter is below:

The Editor, The Age

There are risks in  continuing a pregnancy to term as Dr. Kate Stewart writes (19/2/03)  but there are also many risks in induced abortion other than  of breast cancer.  A recent unimpeachable study of pregnancy-associated deaths in Finland has shown that the risk of dying within a year after an abortion is several times higher than the risk of dying after miscarriage or childbirth..

However Dr. Lanfranchi was speaking specifically about breast cancer. Carrying a baby to term and breastfeeding  significantly reduces breast cancer risk.

Our High Court found in Rogers v. Whitaker that a doctor had an obligation to warn the patient even if the risk was as low as l:14000.  Such a risk is far exceeded in an induced abortion because of the loss of protection achieved by   a  full-term pregnancy and  breastfeeding the baby.  It is paternalistic and patronising not to inform  women of this: let them decide whether they want to increase their risk of a potentially fatal and disfiguring disease or face the hazards of childbirth.   - Lucy De Summa,  Chadstone, Vic. 3148 

Below is the para The Age deleted from Greg Byrne’s letter:   “...The Melbye study is deeply flawed.  Mads Melbye started counting breast cancer cases in 1968 and only included abortions from 1973.  The first rule of epidemiology is that one cannot count incidence of the disease for several years before the alleged cause.

Melbye also erroneously assumed abortion was legalised in 1973.  It was legalised in 1939, and Melbye missed 60,000 abortions recorded in the Danish life statistics,1940-1973. Nevertheless Melbye did find second trimester abortions increased risk, and in a subsequent study found that premature births (which correspond to third trimester abortions) also increased risk of breast cancer....”  

The Age did publish an opinion piece by Dr. Lanfranchi entitled:  "Breast Cancer and  Abortion: the facts",  on 17 February, but this was followed by  a critical article by Helen Keleher, social scientist, Deakin University,  who claimed  Brind's meta-analysis was  "discredited",  and went on to extol the virtues of Melbye's flawed study.  Below is Professor  Brind's response, published on lst March: 

Clarifying cancer research

Helen Keleher claims (Opinion, 20/2) that my review of the evidence of a link between abortion and breast cancer "has been discredited". Ironically, Keleher supports her claim by citing the clinical guideline on induced abortion practice published by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in Britain. That publication refers to my review as "carefully conducted", and states that "the Brind paper had no major methodological shortcomings and could not be disregarded".

Further, The Age (10/2) misquoted from our booklet, “Breast Cancer Risks and Prevention”. No, our booklet does not suggest "a woman with a family cancer history who has an abortion is almost certain to get the disease". To find out what the booklet really says, I invite readers to download it from our website, www.bcpinstitute.org

Joel Brind,

President, Breast Cancer Prevention Institute, New York                                                                  

All in all,  in footy parlance, I think the scores are about even, which is a great  effort on the part of  Endeavour Forum   as we were playing on the home ground of  The Age.  At least  now many more women, men and hopefully teenagers, will have heard about the  abortion-breast cancer link.

Member Organisation, World Council for Life and Family

NGO in Special Consultative Status with ECOSOC of the UN