The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer deplores two Associated Press (AP) articles in less than seven weeks attacking legislative efforts that require doctors to inform women about the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link.[1,2] The AP censored facts that every woman has a right to know.
Both AP stories said the U.S. National Cancer Institute denies a link. However, neither story reported that several medical groups disagree with the government's opinion and do recognize a cause-effect relationship.[3,4]
Neither article reported that government scientists acknowledged abortion as a cause of the disease in a letter to the British medical journal Lancet in 1986.[5]
The AP hasn't reported that the editor of a bioethics journal, Ed Furton, Ph.D., sharply criticized the scientific community this month for failing to "speak out against the shoddy research that is being advanced by those who deny the abortion-breast cancer link."[6]
Furton accused scientists Valerie Beral and her colleagues at Oxford of "Picking conclusions ahead of time and arranging the evidence to support them." Beral et al. authored a "review" of the ABC research for the Lancet in 2004.[7] AP writer Laura Meckler told readers that the Lancet paper found "no link." Yet she refused to report scientific articles harshly criticizing the Lancet paper for its flaws. [6,8]
Neither AP story informed readers about the recognized breast cancer risk of abortion - that the best way to prevent breast cancer is by having more children, starting before age 24, and breastfeeding them. Beral et al. reported these findings in the Lancet in 2002, and the secular press widely reported them as well.[9] The Lancet's 2002 findings contradict its 2004 findings.
Neither article informed women that the biological explanation for an ABC link is plausible and has never been refuted or challenged. It, therefore, remains viable.
"The AP seems to have adopted the government's anti-information agenda," commented Karen Malec, president of the coalition. "Its reporters are willing to report evidence of a negative relationship between abortion and breast cancer, but they're unusually reluctant to report evidence of a positive relationship. It's shameful they have no concerns about protecting women's health."
The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer is an international women's organization founded to protect the health and save the lives of women by educating and providing information on abortion as a risk factor for breast cancer.