New Study Denying Abortion-Breast Cancer Link Has Serious Flaws 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
October 18, 2006
London, England (LifeNews.com) — A new study conducted by researchers as Oxford University in England that claims induced abortions do not raise a woman’s breast cancer risk are seriously flawed. That’s the conclusion of a woman’s group that educates about the link and a leading researcher on the subject.
Published in the October issue of the International Journal of Cancer, the new study claims abortions don’t increase the breast cancer risk but acknowledges that carrying a pregnancy to term reduces it.
Professor Joel Brind, a researcher from Baruch College in New York and the president of the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute, says the new Oxford study is "seriously flawed in the direction of covering up the link."
The study included both abortions and breast cancer diagnoses on women from various European nations up to the year 2000 — but many women were over the age of 40 when abortion was legalized in the countries.
Therefore, many younger women with recent abortions were compared to older breast cancer patients who were too old to have been exposed to legal abortions during most of their fertile years, Brind explained.
"This sort of bad science is becoming disappointingly familiar," Brind added. "It is similar to the flaws in the Danish study" which Brind says had the same flawed analysis as the new Oxford one.
Karen Malec, of the Coalition on Abortion/Breast cancer, says the abortion-breast cancer cover-up by Oxford researchers dates back to 1982.
A study published by the university at that time concluded no abortion-breast cancer link existed but it was irrelevant because it included "only a handful of women" who’d had abortions.
Malec says Dr. Gillian K. Reeves, who published the new study, failed to compare the effect of having an abortion with the effect of having a full term pregnancy.
Two breast cancer risks are associated with an abortion. The first includes the loss of protection a full-term pregnancy afford women in terms of the beneficial effects it has on a woman’s breast. The second concerns the additional risk the abortion itself causes.
Malec said Reeves’ new study failed to answer the question, "Does the woman who has an abortion have a greater risk than does the woman who has a full term pregnancy?"
Last year, Dr. Brind authored a review of ten studies, including two Oxford papers. He concluded that they "embody many serious weaknesses and flaws" and "do not invalidate" the larger body of research supporting a link.
Malec said that researchers are doing a disservice to women and aiding abortion businesses, who don’t want women to avoid having an abortion out of concerns for their medical well-being.
"Cancer researchers are supposed to be dedicated to protecting human lives, not serving the abortion industry," she said.
Related web sites:
Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer – https://www.abortionbreastcancer.com
Breast Cancer Prevention Institute – https://www.bcpinstitute.org
