Abortion in Australia

Media Release from the Reverend Fred Nile MLC, released Tuesday, 22nd September 2010.

The Rev Hon Fred Nile MLC, Leader of the Christian Democratic Party, has raised concern that new scientific research linking abortion and breast cancer is being ignored in Australia for ideological reasons.

"Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer that Australian women suffer, with approximately 14,000 new diagnoses every year. It is a horrific condition that can rob women of their sense of femininity, dignity and ultimately life", said Rev Fred Nile.

"Whilst I applaud the hard work invested by researchers, community groups like the McGrath Foundation and collaborative efforts like pink ribbon day, prevention is always better than cure. So I find it tragic that some in our community are choosing to ignore preventative measures that could directly affect the health and well being of tens of thousands of women. Due to political ideologies, some are still ignoring the growing body of scientific evidence that abortion significantly increases a woman's chances of developing breast cancer.

Because of his concern, Rev Fred Nile raised this issue in the NSW Parliament on Tuesday 21st September 2010, quoting from an affidavit of leading breast cancer surgeon, Angela Lanfranchi:

"I am a breast cancer surgeon practising in New Jersey, since 1984. I hold the position of Clinical Assistant Professor of Surgery at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. I am also a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and am certified by the American Board of Surgery.

She goes on to say:

As a breast cancer surgeon over the last 25 years, I have cared for ever-younger women with breast cancer; my youngest was 25 years old. There has been a 40% increase in incidence in invasive breast cancer over my career. I have researched the causes of these alarming increases over the past fifteen years and have become knowledgeable about the reasons for these trends, one of which is induced abortion ...

Just last year alone, three studies from the United States, China and Turkey, confirmed that abortion is associated with increased risk of breast cancer ...

Epidemiological studies have long confirmed that abortion is associated with increased risk of breast cancer, satisfying the Hill criteria for causation. These studies will necessarily continue to be produced because scientists know that in order to conduct valid studies concerning any risk factor all known variables must be controlled for, and induced abortion is one of them.

The physiology of why abortion increases the risk of breast cancer is well-understood, as explained below.

A lobule is a unit of breast tissue consisting of milk glands and ducts which carry the milk towards the nipple. Before the first full-term pregnancy, a women's breast is about 75% Type 1 and 25% Type 2 lobules where ductal and lobular breast cancers form respectively. By the end of the pregnancy, the breast is about 85% fully matured to cancer-resistant Type 4 lobules and only about 15% immature, cancer-vulnerable lobules remain, thereby reducing the mother's future risk of breast cancer. After weaning, Type 4 lobules become Type 3 lobules. There are permanent changes in the up and down regulation of genes in these Type 3 lobules conferring life-long reduction in breast cancer risk.

During a pregnancy the absolute number of these lobules also increase as the breast doubles in volume with an increase in the number of lobules and a decrease in stroma (the surrounding connective tissue) ...

Only after 32 weeks' gestation does the fetal-placental hormone human placental lactogen ... in concert with other hormones, fully mature the breast lobules into Type 4, making them cancer-resistant. An abortion before 32 weeks prevents this from occurring. The same physiology accounts for an approximate doubling in breast cancer risk due to premature birth before 32 weeks, as shown by several studies. In addition, it has been well-established by at least 2 meta-analyses that abortion increases the risk of future premature births. A combination of these two effects results in a further increase in breast cancer risk from abortion ...

In light of the clear physiology linking abortion to breast cancer, and the numerous studies documenting the increased risk, physicians have a professional duty to disclose that abortion increases the risk of breast cancer.