Every type of hormonal contraception dramatically increases a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer, a new study has found.
Scientists have previously linked the combined contraceptive Pill – which is made up of oestrogen and progestogen – to a 20 per cent increase in developing the disease, while similarly high rates have been identified in the coil and contraceptive implants.
According to a new study by researchers from the University of Oxford, even the new generation of hormonal contraceptives can be just as dangerous.
A team analysed data from more than 9,000 women aged between 20 and 49 who developed invasive breast cancer and compared their lifestyles to 18,000 closely-matched women who did not develop the disease.
They found that women who had used the progestogen-only Pill, the newest generation of oral contraceptives, also increased their risk of developing breast cancer by 20 to 30 per cent.
Once women stopped taking the Pill, the risk of developing the disease progressively declined, according to findings published in the journal Plos Medicine.
Gillian Reeves, Professor of statistical epidemiology and director of the Cancer Epidemiology Unit at the University of Oxford, said: “Yes, there is an increase here, and yes, nobody wants to hear that something that they’re taking is going to increase their risk for breast cancer by 25 per cent.
“The main purpose of doing this research was really to fill a gap in our knowledge,’ she said in comments reported by the Daily Mail.
“We’ve known for many years that combined oral contraceptives, which women have been using for decades, also have an effect on breast cancer risk, a small increase in risk which is transient.
“We weren’t absolutely sure what the corresponding effect of these progestogen-only contraceptives would be.
“What we’ve shown is that they’re just the same in terms of breast cancer risk, they seem to have a very similar effect to the other contraceptives, and the effect that we’ve known about for many years.”
Kirstin Pirie, statistical programmer at Oxford Population Health, and one of the lead authors, said: ‘The findings suggest that current or recent use of all types of progestogen-only contraceptives is associated with a slight increase in breast cancer risk, similar to that associated with use of combined oral contraceptives.
“Given that a person’s underlying risk of developing breast cancer increases with advancing age, the absolute excess risk of breast cancer associated with either type of oral contraceptive will be smaller in women who use it at younger ages.”
In 2020 about 3.2 million women in England were using the combined Pill and a similar number were using the progestogen-only Pill.
Besides the Pill, studies around the world have also shown abortion to be a causal link in the development of breast cancer.
Scientists have said the cancer was caused by high levels of oestradiol, a hormone that stimulates breast growth during pregnancy. The effects of the hormone are minimised in women who take their pregnancy to full term but it remains at dangerous levels in those who abort.
There has been an 80 per cent increase in the rate of breast cancer since 1971, at the same time as the number of abortions rose from an annual 18,000 to well over 200,000 a year.
The Catholic Church has always forbidden the use of contraception, most notably in Humanae Vitae, the 1968 encyclical of Pope St Paul VI “on the regulation of birth”.
St Paul included an appeal to scientists in his encyclical to identify ways to help married couples to regulate their fertility without separating the procreative and unitive aspects of the conjugal act.
Since then, a variety of methods of natural family planning have been developed. None is contraceptive in its action but instead rely on accurately identifying the fertile days of a female reproductive cycle and abstaining from intercourse then to avoid pregnancy.
Such methods include the Billings Ovulation Method, which is free, environmentally-friendly and more effective than any contraceptive when used properly and devoid of all side effects and health risks.
Conversely, couples seeking to conceive a child can use the method to pinpoint the most suitable time to achieve a pregnancy.
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