Pop Culture Scan
Breasts, Power and Cancer continued...
by Kim Heismann
Politics of Cancer: Focus on mammograms instead of prevention
While the politics of covering the breast is an interesting societal phenomenon, the politics of our approach to breast cancer is yet another. 
According to The Breast Cancer Fund , breast cancer now strikes more women in the world than any other type of cancer. There are 1,050,346 women worldwide currently fighting breast cancer, and 372,969 women will die from the disease this year. In the 1940's, a woman's lifetime risk of breast cancer was 1 in 22. In the year 2003, the risk was 1 in 8. Imagine all of your female friends in a room. You do the math.
While there are other possible explanations for the increase in breast cancer incidence, the environmental links to breast cancer are startling. A substantial and growing body of evidence indicates that exposures to certain toxic chemicals and hormone-mimicking compounds contribute to the development of breast cancer. In fact, a startling new body of evidence in Puget Sound, Washington found the flame retardant PBDE showing up in breast milk.
However, on the Breast Cancer Action site, I learned that most corporate philanthropy and even some charitable organizations solely promote detection and treatment. Every October begins the media blitz known as National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Pink ribbons abound and the message you keep hearing is, "Get Your Mammogram!" The American Cancer Society itself downplays the risk of cancer from pesticides and other environmental factors, and has historically refused to take a stand on environmental regulation. And although detection is an important part of prevention, it seems to me that preventing carcinogens from reaching our air, water and food sources would be a fitting start.
The biggest question seems to lie in a discrepancy: How can hotbeds of breast cancer such as Long Island and San Francisco exist if the environment was not a factor? And why aren't more people focusing their energy and support into the answer to that question?
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