May Cause Cancer

ON November 4 of last year, the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) published a study that the media have treated as an unscientific scare story, the way they should have treated the Alar and PCB cancer scares of years past. The study, by Dr. Janet Dating, et al., found a significant overall increase in breast cancer among Washington State women who had had one or more induced abortions (as opposed to spontaneous abortions, or miscarriages, which were not associated with increased risk).

The spin doctoring began immediately—and not just in the popular media, but in the professional medical press. In fact, even as the Daling study rolled off the press, it was undercut by an accompanying editorial warning that “neither a coherent body of knowledge nor a convincing biologic mechanism has been established.” Articles critical of the study continued to appear well into this summer.

JB

About the Author

Joel Brind

ON November 4 of last year, the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) published a study that the media have treated as an unscientific scare story, the way they should have treated the Alar and PCB cancer scares of years past. The study, by Dr. Janet Dating, et al., found a significant overall increase in breast cancer among Washington State women who had had one or more induced abortions (as opposed to spontaneous abortions, or miscarriages, which were not associated with increased risk).

The spin doctoring began immediately—and not just in the popular media, but in the professional medical press. In fact, even as the Daling study rolled off the press, it was undercut by an accompanying editorial warning that “neither a coherent body of knowledge nor a convincing biologic mechanism has been established.” Articles critical of the study continued to appear well into this summer.