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Enjoy your visit.
October 20, 2004
What could possibly be wrong with breast cancer awareness month?

Take a look at who is sponsering it! This is a letter from a brave woman that I know:


A year ago today I was diagnosed with breast cancer. For many obvious
reasons, it felt to Eric and I that breast cancer inundated our world. Bus
advertisements, post offices, magazine covers: every surface seemed to
encourage mammograms, tout developments in chemo drugs or lament the
seemingly mysterious spread of the breast cancer epidemic (now affecting 1
in 7 women in their lifetimes). One of us finally noticed the irony:
October 1, the day of my diagnosis, is the first day of Breast Cancer
Awareness Month.

A year later, my world is still colored by an awareness of breast cancer.
I'm done with conventional treatments and feel back to my normal self, but
almost every decision I make--about food, play, work--is about preventing
recurrence. While there is no one surefire way to prevent cancer (or heart
disease, diabetes or other similarly rampant diseases) I've learned about
many proven and effective ways to lower risk. Breast cancer is no longer
uncommon for women like myself-young, healthy, strong. Almost one in two
men now get cancer in their lifetimes, almost one in three women. I would
think prevention would be a top goal of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, or
any of the other cancer establishment initiatives. The fact that it's not
is something I wanted to spread some awareness about.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month focuses solely on detection and treatment.
None of the posters or talk shows will tell you about prevention. I've read
that AstraZeneca, Inc., the sole sponsor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month,
approves or vetoes every poster, pamphlet and advertisement. AstraZeneca,
Inc. is the manufacturer of tamoxifen, the most widely used breast cancer
treatment drug (the topic of yet a different controversy). Even more
disconcerting is that when AstraZeneca began Breast Cancer Awarenss Month
in 1985, it was owned by Imperial Chemical Industries, one of largest
manufacturers of pesticides and plastics, many of which are clearly
implicated in the cause of breast cancer. (It's now been merged with a
Swedish pharmaceutical company.)

The motto of Breast Cancer Awareness Month is "Early Detection is Your
Best Protection". I hear this and I feel myself back in those first days of
last October-my four-year-old wondering if surgery would hurt me, my
one-year-old suddenly not allowed to nurse-and I get upset all over again.
Early detection didn't protect me; mammograms don't keep anyone from getting
cancer. There's no question that detection and treatment are important
elements in the breast cancer picture. It's pitching them to the exclusion
of prevention and calling it protection that disturbs me so much.

What I would like to see is a breast cancer awareness campaign that
plasters billboards with images of organic broccoli blocking the initiation
of cancer in cells or carrots protecting DNA from radiation and chemical
exposures. I'd like to read pamphlets explaining that food is the primary
route through which many environmental carcinogens enter the human body and
posters showing that the cumulative load of toxic chemicals in our bodies
means there's no such thing as a trace exposure anymore. If breast cancer
awareness-equal parts focused on prevention, detection and treatment-hit the
streets like the anti-smoking campaign did, I might feel protected. Or at
least I'd feel knowledgeable about the choices I'm making. I guess this
e-mail is my first personal step in this campaign.

So here are the two things I consider most important to be aware of.
First, prevention is possible by reducing your risk, no matter how much
chlorinated tap water you've ingested, or what your genetics are, or how
much nonorganic meat you've eaten. Second, detection and treatment receive
substantial amounts of funding, so consider donating to organizations that
fund prevention research. The following organizations are resources in both
cases:

Breast Cancer Action
The Breast Cancer Fund
Cancer Prevention Coalition
Breast Cancer Action


My motto, "Prevention is the best protection".

Straight from the Queen's mouth. Sayeth rzan at 11:14 AM
Comments:
Mountain dweller