30 Years of Breast Screening: 1.3 Million Wrongly TreatedSayer Ji, Contributor A disturbing new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine is bringing mainstream attention to the possibility that mammography has caused far more harm than good in the millions of women who have employed it over the past 30 years as their primary strategy in the fight against breast cancer.[i] Titled Effect of Three Decades of Screening Mammography on Breast-Cancer Incidence, researchers estimated that among women younger than 40 years of age, breast cancer was overdiagnosed, i.e. tumors were detected on screening that would never have led to clinical symptoms, in 1.3 million U.S. women over the past 30 years. In 2008, alone, breast cancer was overdiagnosed in more than 70,000 women; this accounted for 31% of all breast cancers diagnosed. As we revealed in a previous article,[ii] the primary form of mammography-detected breast cancer isductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), also known as stage zero or non-invasive breast cancer. Unlike truly invasive cancer, which expands outward like the crab after which it was named (Greek: Cancer = Crab), ductal carcinoma is in situ, i.e. situated, non-moving an obvious contradiction in terms. The new study authors point out The introduction of screening mammography in the United States has been associated with a doubling in the number of cases of early-stage breast cancer that are detected each year. And yet, they noted, only 6.5% of these early-stage breast cancer cases were expected to progress to advanced disease. DCIS and related abnormal breast findings, in other words, may represent natural, benign variations in breast morphology. Preemptive treatment strategies, however, are still employed today as the standard of care, with mastectomy rates actually increasing since 2004.[iv] The adverse health effects associated with overdiagnosis and overtreatment with lumpectomy, radiation, chemotherapy and hormone-suppressive treatments cannot be underestimated, especially when one considers the profound psychological trauma that follows each stage of diagnosis and treatment, and the additional physiological burdens such psychic injuries lead to, including up-regulation of multidrug resistance genes within cancer as a result of the increased adrenaline associated with the flight-or-fight stress response.[v] Also, it is now coming to light that chemotherapy and radiation actually increase the proportion of the highly malignant cancer stem cells to the relatively non-malignant daughter cells within the tumor colony. Much in the same way that conventional antibiotic agents will drive multidrug resistance within the subpopulation of surviving post-antibiotic bacteria, ensuring recurrence, conventional treatments also drive the surviving stem-cell enriched tumor populations into greater resistance and metastatic potential when it does inevitably recur. Or worse,radiation therapy may actually increase the stemness of breast cancer cells making them 30 times more malignant (capable of forming new tumors). If it is indeed true that DCIS, other abnormal breast findings, as well as clinically confirmed invasive breast cancer, either remain benign or regress when left untreated, the entire breast cancer industry, which is already deeply mired in cause-marketing conflicts of interest, must radically reform itself, or face massive financial and ethical liabilities vis--vis outdated and no longer evidence-based practices. Another serious problem with mammography (and there are dozens of them) not addressed in this latest research finding concerns the unique carcinogenicity of the x-rays the technology employs. We now know that the 30 kVp radiation, colloquially known as low energy x-rays, are between 300-400% more carcinogenic than the higher energy radiation given off by atomic bomb blasts (200 kVp or higher).[vi] Present day radiation risk models used to assess the known breast cancer risk associated with mammography against the purported benefits do not take into this profound discrepancy. In fact, these models were developed before DNA was even discovered. Also, considering that breast cancer susceptibility genes, BRCA1/BRCA2, interfere with the DNA self-repair mechanisms needed to reduce the carcinogenicity associated with radiation exposure within those who carry these genetic variations, the harms associated with mammography may be exponentially higher than the conventional medical community presently understands and communicates to their patients. Indeed, it is likely that x-ray based mammography screenings have been planting the seeds of future radiation-induced breast cancer within exposed populations. For more alternative information on breast cancer, and related womens health issues, visit our health guides on GreenMedInfo.com. Also, view the free webinar titled The Problem with Pink hosted by the co-authors of Cancer Killers: The Cause is the Cure below: Resources [ii] GreenMedInfo.com, Mammograms Linked To An Epidemic of Misdiagnosed Cancers, Oct. 5th, 2012 [iii] Per-Henrik Zahl, Peter C Gtzsche, Jan Mhlen . Natural history of breast cancers detected in the Swedish mammography screening programme: a cohort study. Lancet Oncol. 2011 Nov ;12(12):1118-24. Epub 2011 Oct 11. PMID: 21996169 [iv] GreenMedInfo.com, Mastectomy Research [v] GreenMedInfo.com, Stress Hormones Found To Make Cancer Resistant To Treatment [vi] GreenMedInfo.com, Low Dose Ionizing Radiation Related: A Cancer Answer This article first appeared at GreenMedInfo. Please visit to access their vast database of articles and the latest information in natural health. 