|
Estrogen & Progestin
Combination Increases Cancer Risk
January 25,
2000 – A comprehensive 15 year study of 46,355
women has revealed that estrogen drugs, like Premarin, America’s
top selling drug, increases a woman’s risk of breast cancer
by 1% for every year of use. Even more alarmingly, the study
found that the combination of estrogen and progestin, a synthetic
version of progesterone, increases the risk of breast cancer
by 8% for every year of use.
For the average
woman, getting a prescription of estrogen hormone replacement
therapy
at age 50 means raising an already elevated
risk of breast cancer 20% by age 70. Those who were using or
had recently used the estrogen-progestin combination therapy
had a 40% higher risk of developing breast cancer than women
who did not take any hormones. What’s more, her risk of
breast cancer goes up 160% by age 70.
In recent
years, Doctors began routinely prescribing progestin with estrogen
because,
although they have not wanted to admit
it, they know that estrogen alone increases the risk of uterine
cancer. Adding Progestin has been shown to reduce that risk uterine
cancer by causing monthly menstrual sloughing of the uterine
lining. Although original studies of Progestin in beagles revealed
that it did cause an increased incidence of breast cancer, these
results were ignored because the studies were done in beagles.
Now it’s evident that the medical community has been in
denial about these increased risks.
Conventional medicine rationalizes the fact that they have prescribed
drugs that have spurned an epidemic of cancers by saying that
Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) purportedly prevents heart
disease and osteoporosis. Since there are 1.5 million heart attacks
and more than 1 million hip fractures annually in this country
compared to only 175,000 cases of breast cancer, many doctors
believe that the risks of heart disease and osteoporosis outweigh
the risk of cancer caused by HRT drugs.
As a patient
you should be entitled to a full disclosure of the facts. You
should be
told the risks as well as any alternative
solutions. Unfortunately, most doctors don’t know any alternative
solutions. Instead, most doctors, without explaining any details,
simply insist that there is only one way, their way, and prescribe
HRT to all women or age 50.
However, one Harvard epidemiologist, Walter C. Willett, is speaking
out. In an editorial that appeared in the same issue of JAMA, he
says, "This has major implications for risk-benefit considerations
because the risks of hip fracture and coronary heart disease – primary
targets of preventive use of hormone therapy – do not become
large until a decade or more after menopause."
"The commonly held belief that aging routinely requires pharmacological
management has unfortunately led to neglect of diet and lifestyle
as the primary means to achieve healthy aging," he added.
Hooray for reason! I whole heatedly agree with Walter Willett.
Diet and lifestyle are the key issues and should be the primary
focus in fighting the effects of aging. Drugs are inherently
dangerous. They only alter symptoms of disease and almost inevitably
create devastating side effects, often worse than the disease
they are intended to treat.
|
